Not Another Love Story
by InceptionErection
Summary: What happens when a social butterfly heiress from out of town moves to Gotham to start a new branch of the company rivaling Bruce's? And what happens when the same girl's secret life, rivals the supposed playboy's secret life? Give chapter 1 a chance,B/OC
1. Chapter 1

**Not Another Love Story**

**Summary: **So, you all know Bruce Wayne, right? The playboy, the secretive masked vigilante, the business man. Yeah, well, this is one of _those _stories. No, not one of those 'damsel-in-distress-falls-in-love-after-being-taken-to-Bruce's-penthouse-after-scare' stories, in this one, Bruce's life will be turned upside down. So, what happens when a social butterfly heiress from out of town move's to Gotham to start a new branch of the company rivaling Bruce's? And what happens when the same girl's secret life, rivals the supposed playboy's secret life? Give chapter one a chance and see where it goes.

**Chapter 1**

"Who told you to do that?" A very irritated Amelia Bennet walked briskly past the front desk to her new office, speaking currently to her former assistant at the main branch who hired a new assistant without authorization. "Cynthia, you were my assistant for five years. You know better than anyone that all new employees have to go personally through an interview with me _and _a background check, and this new girl didn't get either. You all seem to forget that I own this company, and though I may be across the country I'm still in charge. This is a warning. Next time, you may not be as lucky." She sighed in exhaustion before plopping into her new office chair. She hated starting a new office branch. It just meant more stress, and more boxes.

She picked up a gift basket that held an assortment of various foreign chocolates and rare fruits, it presented a card that read 'Welcome to Gotham! Every best wish to you and your company. -The city of Gotham.' Amelia shoved the card into her briefcase with the many other welcome cards she's received, and put the gift basket on the large scale bookshelf behind her desk, looking into the random articles laying on her desk. A contract to sign here, merger deals to deny there; the usual.

A knock came at her door, before a petite lady a little younger looking than her came timidly into the room. "Ms. Bennet? You have a call waiting on line one."

"Thank you Violet. Please, call me Amelia." She sighed, stressed. She really didn't feel like taking calls right now. "Bennet & Sons, this is Amelia."

"Emma. Did you get the papers I sent you?"

"Ryan, I really don't have time to sign your divorce papers. I just transferred to our new building in Gotham. Call me back in a couple of weeks when things settle down."

"Unfortunately, doll, I don't have time for you to settle in. I have a girl here who's anxious to get hitched." Amelia made a noise of disgust into the phone before responding as calmly as she could.

"Oh, found a new hooker to get a new disease from? If you happen to recall one of your last classless ladies was the reason for our marriage falling apart."

"Amelia, I don't have time for your bull. Sign the papers."

"Fine. But you're lucky I don't sue you for all you're worth; which isn't much." She said before hanging up the phone rather angrily. "Damn. The movers are probably at the house already." She stood her 5'10" body up from the comfortable office chair to head to the elevator, preparing to see her new home. It was on the larger scale, close to the office, but on the opposite side of town; as to avoid the narrows. The house fit her simple, yet vintage style. The home came pre-furnished with classic twenties style decor; which went along with her twenties style fitted suits that were soon to adorn her closet.

Pulling her Porsche Panamera into the new driveway, she looked to the house that she would be occupying. It was on the large side; having five bedrooms, four and half baths, a large finished basement, a large backyard, and a gourmet kitchen. She inspected each room to her heart's content, and told the movers where to put everything before heading down to the basement to explore. The basement probably took up the entire layout of the house, leaving it quite large. Amelia brought down a few boxes labeled 'BASEMENT FRAGILE.' In means to keep the movers from rustling her items around. She boxed the items beforehand so they wouldn't snoop. She really didn't need people knowing what she was up to when she moved from town-to-town. She wandered around the well lit area, finding herself come into a separate room, that was more dimly lit. She found bookcases filled with books lining two of the walls; running perpendicular to each other. Running her hands along one, she came across one of her favorite books in a rare first edition. Reaching to grab it off the shelf to examine it, it caught with a second book and the books tipped back. Cringing, and waiting for the rare books to fall to the ground, she instead felt a whoosh of cool air; blowing her wavy, dyed, copper red hair - recently taken down from her tight bun - behind her shoulders. Her heart rate increased in anticipation before entering the room. Instantly reminding her of a speakeasy, there were bare cement walls with sporadic lamps lining the outside of the walls. A few wooden desks were left behind from whoever was last in this room. She wondered if the previous owners even knew this was here. Seeing this as the next hideout for her, she brought the boxes in with her and grabbed a flashlight from the upstairs before searching around the strange room again.

She discovered one stained glass window that was covered from the outside by a bush, and a small tunnel hidden behind a locked door. She found the key on the door frame; obviously waiting to be discovered yet again. She traveled up the stairway at the end of the tunnel to find herself coming out of an external carriage house looking building in the very back of the backyard. Finding the key worked in the outer door to the shed, she locked the door and traveled back into the house to check the progress off the moving.

She would have to thank her best friend, Regina, - the only one who knew her secret - for finding this amazing house for her. It all seemed too staged to have stumbled upon this house spontaneously, as Regina said she had.

Finding the movers finished in her house, Amelia finally had time to sit on her blue couch for the first time. She paid who she was supposed to before showing them out the door.

Plugging in the T.V., she turned it on and changed it to the nearest channel that wasn't on a commercial break. All she saw was a picture of her form a few years back and a headline that a nasal newscaster was reading that said, "Heiress to the Bennet & Sons fortune, Amelia Bennet, opens her new branch of the multi-million dollar company in our very own Gotham city tomorrow. Bennet took over the company after her father's untimely loss to cancer, and her mother's unfortunate disappearance two years earlier. The company is a well known rival to Wayne industries, will there be problems between the two companies? Will there be problems between the two young heir's of their companies? Or will a new industrial, or romantic, relationship be formed? More at ten."

"Yeah right. Disappearance my ass. She ran off with her French beau." Amelia groaned, getting up from the couch. She might as well go out and make an appearance. She decided to throw on an off-white drop-waist shimmering dress that ended about her mid-thigh. She decided to curl her unnatural red hair and threw on a couple of items of jewelry. She called to reserve a table for one over at the Criterion in the city. It wasn't hard to get a table, most people aren't eating alone at that sort of restaurant.

Handing her keys to the valet, she stepped out of the car to check if her table was ready. Making her way into the building, she heard the impatient scuffle of shoes behind her, subtly glancing behind her to see the very own, Bruce Wayne, looking extremely bored, riding her heels into the restaurant. Slowing her pace even more, she took her dear sweet time going into the building.

"Welcome Ms. Bennet, your table is ready for you." A nice waiter greeted her, taking her light jacket; that was protecting her from the aftershocks of a brutal Gotham winter.

"A Ms. Bennet is it?" Amelia looked up from her half-empty water glass at a tall, handsome, man with brown hair and brown eyes.

"Yes. You must be Mr. Bruce Wayne."

"Please, call me Bruce. You just moved here, right?"

"Amelia, please. And yes, from New York."

"This seat taken?"

"No. Take it please."

"So, what brings you to Gotham?"

"Oh, you know. Business dominance, the norm." She replied slyly. He lifted his eyebrows, bemusedly. "So, I guess the whole city of Gotham is trying to set us up as well. Let me tell you though, I just left a bad marriage, and I'm not interested in getting into anything else if that's what you're trying to pull, sitting here." Amelia said haughtily whipping herself from her seat and dropping a hundred dollar bill at the waiter and went to get her keys.

"What did I say?" Bruce wondered innocently.

**A/N: Okay, here's my new story! I just wanted to get in some character development and all that boring stuff. Just let me know what you think!**

**Good? Bad? Lemme know!  
**


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter 2 **

**A/N: I forgot to mention that this is post-TDK. Also, any info I got on batman, his suit, Wayne enterprises, and the superhero 'the Empress' was found on wikipedia. A.K.A. All the info about Amelia's suit and business are pretty much the same as Bruce's.  
**

Amelia passed through her house in quite a hurry to get her basement up and ready for nights to come. She needed to get things set up in the basement, then needed to check out crime hot spots, and get herself noticed.

You could say that she is a traveling vigilante. Every time she's moved, she's started all over again. Her 'name', Empress. A nickname. A sign of who she really was. Her father, a best friend to her, called her 'The Empress of Bennet & Sons', a company passed through sons of five generations. She was the first daughter to have taken over the company.

Releasing her suit from her box, stripping out of the outfit that she was in previously, she slipped on the green leotard, made of stiff kevlar thread and carbon nanotube fibers. She slipped on her long tear resistant boots, ending where her skirt leaves off at the middle of her thigh. Pinning her hair back and putting on her blond wig, - to hide her real hair color - and finally slipping on the dark green mask that surrounded her eyes, she felt good to be back in action.

Slipping the suit back off and slipping back into her dress, she moved the desks around until she found a place where she could set everything up strategically.

Looking at her watch, she cursed inwardly; seeing as it was eleven p.m. and she had to be at the office by seven for a long day of meetings. Slipping into her bedroom after checking all her locks, she thought about what she needed to do the next day. Although she had been in the top of her class in her self-defense classes, she still wanted an alarm system. She had to meet her newest partner, Kara, coming in from Washington. She had to mail the divorce papers back to Ryan. And lastly, she would probably have to face the press so she wanted to get some things to keep herself sane when she was bombarded with questions; considering she's a rival to the top company in the state. Nation even. She climbed into bed, out cold as soon as her head hit the pillow.

~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~

"Alfred, I want some information on Amelia Bennet." Bruce said, striding into the newly finished Wayne Manor.

"Is there a problem, sir?" Alfred Pennyworth asked, setting down his teacup and newspaper.

"She's a rival to Wayne Enterprises and just opened a branch in the city. She doesn't seem very friendly either. I met her at dinner tonight."

"I'll get as much information as I can, sir." Alfred said, following Bruce into the batcave, where Bruce would start his nightly routine. "Amelia Peyton Bennet. Recently divorced from a Ryan Grey for adultery. Twenty-nine years old and turns thirty, three days after you turn thirty-one. She's been accused for suspicious behavior late at night, but never investigated. She took martial arts, self-defense, and tai-kwan do; she was the top of her class in all three, master Bruce."

"Suspicious behavior? I'll have to look into that." Bruce said, accusingly.

"As I recall, sir, you've had the same charges. Maybe she's a masked vigilantress." Alfred said jokingly. Bruce looked over at him skeptically, before preparing to slip on his batsuit.

~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~

"Goodmorning, Ms. Amelia. The mail is on your desk and you have a call waiting on line one." Violet greeted a very tired Amelia when she walked up to her office that morning.

"This is Amelia." She greeted as cheerfully as she could.

"Goodmorning Ms. Bennet. Mr Wayne was wondering if you would be interested in setting up a lunch meeting today around one." Amelia rolled her eyes. _What is this man trying to pull._

"What would be the means of this lunch meeting?"

"I don't know the motives for Mr. Wayne's personal business, I'm just sent to make the call." Amelia grinned. _Very clever._

"Unfortunately, I just started the business today so, I'll be pretty busy. I can reschedule for tomorrow."

"Alright, let me check with Mr. Wayne, please hold." Amelia listened to the cheesy 'elevator music' for a few moments before the secretary came back to inform her that that would work before hanging up.

"Ms. Amelia, there's a Kara Shaw here to see you."

"Send her in please, Violet."

A lovely woman of Asian heritage walked into Amelia's office, and greeted her with a smile that reached her pale green eyes.

"You must be Kara, my newest business partner from our Washington branch. Welcome." Amelia said, with a sincere smile. She hoped she would become friends with this woman.

"It's an honor to work with you Ms. Bennet." Kara replied nervously.

"Please, it's Amelia. I'm very excited to work with you. Now, if you'll come with me, I'll show you around the office and show you your new office."

"Thank you very much."

"So, what made you volunteer to come to Gotham? Do you have family in the area?"

"No, my nearest family is where the headquarters are in California. I just needed a change of scenery."

"I know how you feel. I change locations every few months when we open new branches internationally. But hopefully, we'll be taking the company worldwide in a few years. It was always my parent's dream."

"I'm really sorry about what happened to your dad."

"Thank you. But, he was really suffering in his last few months, and it's nice to know he's in a better place." It was quite true. Her father had always been a devout Christian - which she never caught on to, much to her father's dismay - and had become even closer in his relationship with the Father in his last few months. Which is part of the reason her father's company was the way it was. It was a top-rate company that sent millions of dollars a year to various charities, police departments, hospitals, homeless shelters, and militaries. After hearing about the extensive city-wide damage Gotham suffered through after the Joker's untimely attack on the city, Amelia decided it best to open a branch in a place that really needed it. She hoped to take it to developing countries in a short while.

The company itself wasn't just a giant charity fund, it did other various things like, chemicals, electronics, shipping, medical, and other things of the like.

Showing Kara her office, and telling her office hours; all the boring stuff, she left to go back to her office to sort things out. The first contribution she made to the city was the police department; after suffering from an explosion caused by the Joker.

"Commissioner Jim Gordon on line one for you." Violet's voice came over the intercom.

"This is Amelia."

"Ms. Bennet, this is Jim Gordon."

"Hello, Commissioner, how are you today?"

"Just fine thank you. Listen, I wanted to thank you for your contribution to the MCU. Also, your donation to the memorial for the people who's lives were taken during this past attack on the city."

"No really, it's my pleasure. I would want someone to do the same if I died for standing up for something."

"Yes well, the Gotham City Police Department would like you to attend our fundraiser for the Gotham General Hospital reconstruction event in a week."

"I'd love to. When, and where?"

"Wayne Manor, seven p.m., next Friday." Amelia groaned. _Great. _

This was one fundraiser, she was not looking forward to going to.

**A/N: There you have it!**

**Good? Bad? Lemme know!  
**


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter 3**

The ride from Bennet & Sons: Gotham Branch, was an uneventful one. The silence looming in the back of Bruce Wayne's car made Amelia uncomfortable. Entering the restaurant, Amelia took the time to study the restaurant, admiring it's architecture. It had dozens of columns spread around the facility, two's joined together by stone arches. There was a spiral staircase near the back, maybe for a meeting room or for a birthday, just in front of the swinging doors to the kitchen. The maitre d' greeted them warmly, and took them to their table more near the back at the edge of the room, near a window.

"Amelia, I wanted to apologize; for if I said anything to set you off the other night." Bruce said after ordering himself a drink.

"No, you didn't say anything wrong. I was just stressed out what from Ryan hounding me about the divorce papers to opening up the new branch. If anyone should apologizing, it's me; for acting like such a spoiled brat." Amelia replied, taking a sip of her water and adjusting the blazer of her favorite blue fitted suit.

"Divorce? I'm very sorry to hear that. But, if I may say, your husband must be an idiot to divorce you." Bruce tried to seem as innocent as possible on the subject of her divorce. In his own mind, though, he wanted to punch this Ryan guy in the face for divorcing such a seemingly classy lady.

"You may. And he is." She replied; earning a chuckle form Bruce. "You're a very smooth talker, Mr. Wayne."

"I try my best, Ms. Bennet." Bruce replied. "Are you attending the fundraiser for the hospital next Friday?"

"Yes, it's at your house, right?"

"That's right. Do you have an escort?"

"No, why do you ask?"

"It's not right for such a classy lady as yourself, to show up at a party without an escort." Bruce said, with his most charming smile.

"You really are too kind. But, tell me Mr. Wayne, is this an invitation for you to escort me? Or is it simply a ploy to get out of your four-week relationship with your french girlfriend?" Amelia asked, quirking an eyebrow and leaning forward.

"Ms. Bennet, you really must keep up with your news. Adrianne moved back to Paris about a week ago. So, does that answer your questions?"

"Yes. I guess you could have the honor of escorting me to your fundraiser." Amelia said, in a mock 'high-and-mighty' fashion; holding out her hand for him to kiss it, closing her eyes and sticking her nose into the air.

~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~

"I'm not as classy as you think." Amelia said, on the way back to the car; after their lunch. Bruce lifted his eyebrows, signaling that he wanted to know what she was talking about. "My clothes and my demeanor may be classy, but my attitude is quite bitter."

"As in?"

"I told Ryan to go home to his whore fiance yesterday." Amelia said nonchalantly.

"You know, I'm disliking this Ryan more and more every time I hear of him." Now it was Amelia's turn to raise her eyebrows. "Why would he go off with a prostitute when he had you?"

"Because she'll give him what he wants. Or so he thinks. Along with being a prostitute, she also has been known for selling drugs on the side. So, he gets his lap dance and his fix." Amelia nodded in thanks when Bruce opened the car door for her, and she climbed in. "I'm not proud of divorcing him. I don't come from a family of divorce, and I hate to think that my dad would be disappointed in my life choices. Ryan just seemed like the perfect guy. He was sweet, he was chivalrous, we had so much in common. Then he just changed. A few years after we were married he just changed. I stuck it out for a year; thinking it was a phase, but he didn't come out of it. So, I divorced him last year, and it's taken this long to finalize."

"I don't think your father would be disappointed. You're an amazing woman."

"Thank you. No, I don't think he would be, I just feel it, you know? Although, come to think of it, my father told me on my wedding day, that if Ryan ever hurt me - emotionally or physically - he would forge my signature on the divorce papers and personally find him and cut off his precious manhood with an exacto knife." Amelia said followed by a slight blush that read 'did I really just say that out loud?' Bruce laughed, the first time she had really seen him laugh. "Thank you; for lunch, and the ride back to the office."

"It's no problem, at all. I'll pick you up at six on Friday?"

"Sounds good. See you then." Amelia walked into her office with a feeling of happiness; one she hadn't felt in some time. Though, the happiness was short lived when she saw a strange pair of blue pumps on her bookcase behind the desk.

"So, you and Mr. Bruce Wayne, huh?" An all too familiar voice quizzed Amelia

"Regina!" Amelia exclaimed, dropping the notes of left messages Violet had stuck to the door, and rushing over to give her childhood friend a giant hug. "I thought you weren't going to visit until the summer!"

"I got a couple days off, and I thought I'd see how everything was. So, how do you like the house? Is it suited to your liking?"

"I'm in love with it, I must admit. It fits my style perfectly."

"I knew you'd fall in love with it! Oh, speaking of which, how's the basement? Is it good?"

"Oh, it's fabulous. Works perfectly for me. Thank you so much Reggie!"

"Oh, how's the, uh, _night life?_" Regina said, winking.

"I haven't really started in action yet, I have to figure out where to start first."

"So, 'Lia, tell me about you and Bruce-y boy here." Regina inquired, showing her a newspaper article of her and Bruce at dinner her first night there. Amelia groaned.

"He's just a friend, we just met. That was the first time I'd ever talked to him."

"Then, why is it the article reads: 'Bennet & Sons heiress storms out of dinner date with infamous playboy, Bruce Wayne'?" Regina eyed her skeptically.

"Because, Ryan was riding my butt to get the divorce papers signed, and he just kind of waltzed in like he owned the place."

"Sweetie, that's because he does. Literally. Now, I wanna hear more. Are there going to be any more dates?"

"He's taking me to a fundraiser at his house next Friday, but it is _not_ a date."

"Oh girl, get some!" Regina joked, throwing her fist into the air in mock victory. Amelia rolled her eyes and asked Violet to send any calls to Kara, after asking Kara if it was okay if she took the rest of the day off.

Amelia decided to show Regina Gotham, and took her shopping at a few of the street shops. Amelia bought a black mermaid style fitted dress that accentuated her girlish figure and a beaded cream color clutch to go along for the fundraiser.

"Girl, what is with you and the twenties." Regina asked, while Amelia tried on a new black drop-waist dress with intricate beading on the bodice.

"It was a very classy time period for fashion back then, and it suits my body type."

"How does Bruce feel about your choice in clothing?"

"Like he cares."

"It certainly looks like he does." Regina said, pointing the the front window of the store, where she saw Bruce walking by but stopped as soon as Amelia walked out of the dressing room. Amelia blushed a bright red, and tried to run back to the dressing room before Regina grabbed her hand.

"Amelia, you look great." Bruce commented when he came in.

"Thank you. Bruce, this is Regina. Regina, this is Bruce. She's a childhood friend, and she helped me find my house in Gotham."

"Nice to meet you." Bruce said, holding out his hand.

"Likewise." Said Regina, taking his hand in hers.

"Is that what you're wearing to the fundraiser?"

"No, no. I was just trying this one on for fun." Amelia replied anxiously. _Why am I getting so anxious around him all the sudden?_

"Well, it looks good on you. You should buy it."

"Oh no, it's way out of my price range." Bruce nodded in understanding, and sighed in frustration when his phone rang.

"It was nice to see you. I'll see you next Friday." He said before answering the call, and walking briskly out of the store.

"He's totally all over you." Regina commented. Amelia rolled her eyes, trying to look nonchalant, although her face told everyone else differently.

"Let's get out of here." Amelia said; returning the dress to the rack that it came from.

**A/N: So here's my update! I'm working on chapter six right now, (I'm trying to stay ahead so I don't lose motivation like I have been on my other stories.) and am happy to report that vigilantress action will be happening in the next chapter!**

**Good? Bad? Lemme know!  
**


	4. Chapter 4

**Chapter 4**

The next few days were a blur for Amelia, what with Regina dragging her all around Gotham, to thinking about Bruce, and about how she should really start going out at night.

It nearly brought tears to Amelia's eyes; seeing Regina off at the airport. She promised she'd be back in the summer, but that was nearly four months away. Leaving the airport, Amelia decided to go home and slip on her suit. The sun was setting quickly in the city, and she wanted to go out and search. The drive from the airport was a long one, and the sun was gone before she even reached her house.

Pulling her car into the new driveway, driving all the way back to her carriage house for easy access to her 'lair' as she jokingly called it. walking past the motorcycle that she used when she was working, she unlocked the floor space to the stairs that led down to the place where she kept her suit. The wardrobe where she kept her suit, was bought in an old antique mall back in California. It was green, and she painted a black 'E' onto it; mimicking her suit exactly.

Slipping on her suit, she moved around and stretched in it to loosen the material; considering she hadn't moved around in it since the day before she moved from New York. She made her way back through the tunnels, and slipped on her mask before climbing onto the bike and going through the doors for the first time. The motorcycle itself was a sleek green high-tech piece of machinery. She turned on the low-key feature, which was developed specially for her so she could cruise around quiet areas without being detected.

She drove past Wayne tower, and headed towards the narrows. It sounded cliche but, that was probably where most of the crime happened. She heard yelling coming from an alleyway behind a club. She left the motorcycle about a block away; leaving on the thumb-print identification start-up feature on, knowing it was too heavy for anyone else to try and take it themselves.

"I told you to get the money, and bring it back here; and guess what? You failed! I'm done giving you second chances."

"No boss, I just, no. Wait!" The Empress heard a gunshot, and started running towards the alleyway. She snuck around and peeked at the end of the alley and saw a scrawny looking guy bending over the body, muttering something she couldn't hear. Tip-toeing down the alley, she approached the man from behind holding her grappling gun to his head for intimidation.

"I wouldn't do that if I were you."

"Well luckily, you're not." She said, disguising her voice an octave lower, in a huskier tone.

"Look girly, I don't know who you think you are but-"

"Who are you working for?" She interrogated

"I'm da boss. I don't work for nobody."

"That's where you're wrong. You think you're on top, but you're just another minion. She pressed a release button which sounded like a gun cocking, and felt him stiffen.

"I'm not intimidated by a girl." He said, trying to sound confident. But she caught a crack in his voice at the end of his sentence. He snapped his fingers and two large thugs came out from the darkness.

She handcuffed him quickly to a pipe before approaching the two thugs. Taking her stance, she saw one lunge for her with a knife. It nicked the top of her shoulder; but she barely felt it with all the adrenaline flowing through her. She stood herself back up and roundhouse kicked one of them in the face and thrusting the heel of her hand into his nose and landing one last kick to his temple before he fell to the ground, unconscious. While catching her breath, the second thug landed a punch in her stomach and she doubled over in pain. Trying to recover quickly, she kicked his feet out from under him and pushed her fingers down on his pressure points, and he passed out.

"Who do you work for?" She asked the man again.

"Maroni."

"He's in jail."

"He has people on the inside giving orders to people on the outside."

"What happened here?" A gruff voice from behind her spoke.

"One of Maroni's guys." The Empress replied. "He sent thugs out and I took care of them. Have you contacted the police?"

"Yes."

~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~

"What, another vigilante?" A police officer asked skeptically, eyeing the Empress.

"Really batman, you're lucky these two thugs aren't dead." Gordon said.

"With all-do respect, it's vigilantress. And-" Empress started, but was interrupted by Batman

"I didn't beat those guys up."

"You mean _she _beat them up?" The officer looked even more skeptical. "I think I'm in love."

"Yes well. This is Alfonso Giamardis. He works for Maroni, been on the run for a while and no one's been able to catch him. How did you seem to find him on your first day out?" Gordon shook his head at the newest officer.

"I kind of stumbled upon them, perusing the neighborhood."

"We should get him down to MCU. Thank you again..." He stumbled, silently inquiring her name.

"You can call me Empress." She said, walking down the alleyway. She really wanted to get home. She needed to attend her wounds and take a painkiller. Wincing slightly as she climbed onto the bike, she started it up and prepared to go home.

**Bruce's POV**

Bruce was confused as to who this new 'vigilantress' was. He felt as though he knew her, and yet he didn't. He also wanted to know how she happened to stumble upon a man that has been off the radar for two months. He didn't even think of Amelia's suspicious behavior.

He thought about taking her down. What if she was just another copycat in hockey pads? Then again, none of the copycats exactly beat two large men into unconsciousness before, _after_ getting sliced with a knife. It was impressive. Maybe she could join him. He saw her turn on her motorcycle and prepared to leave.

"Who are you?" He practically growled

"I told you. Empress."

"Why are you here?"

"Wherever I go, I like to help. This city is need of help. Hopefully I can help give it to them. They need a little hope here. Not to say you're not good enough, I just think they're getting a little too used to you. As soon as they realize even a girl can break them down, maybe they'll settle."

"Let me help you with your wounds."

"No, I'll be fine. I'm pretty sure I just beat up two of the biggest men I've seen in my life. I think a little knife cut, I'll be able to handle."

Bruce thought over her words, even for the rest of the night. She was probably right. If a girl could take them down, they might just go away. It seemed too good to be true though, considering this city.

When he got home that night - or rather morning - He took a large dress box out of the closet and observed it. He didn't know when he'd give it to her, but he knew he wanted to. It; would be the dress that Amelia tried on those few days before. He hoped someday it would be some kind of gift that meant something, not just a friends to friends gift.

"Who's that for, sir? Unless you're planning on going through the operation. That might be a problem, then." Alfred asked bringing him some breakfast before he fell asleep for a few hours.

"Amelia."

"Ms. Bennet? I wasn't aware she was in need of a dress. Is it for Friday?"

"No. She just looked good in it so I bought it for her." Alfred nodded and left the room shaking his head, and stifling his laughter.

~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~

Amelia woke groggily that morning, wincing at the pan in her stomach. _I really have to get back into routine._ She thought to herself. She glided through the house and started up the coffee pot.

After retrieving her coffee from the kitchen, she turned on the news before she had to get ready for work.

'A new vigilante - or should I say, 'vigilantress' - has made her debut in Gotham city in the wee hours of the morning last night, according to Commissioner Gordon, she was 'perusing the neighborhood and heard a gunshot.' Either way, she found a local mob member linked to Sal Maroni, while beating a couple of his largest men into concussions. They'll be standing trial in a week. Nobody knows who this new hero 'Empress' is, but she's obviously not someone to mess with. And, will this new young lady be a rival, or possible partner to the infamous Batman? More at five.' The newscaster explained. Amelia felt herself smile. It was good to be able to help people again. Now, she just had to worry about the fundraiser in two days.

**A/N: So, here's the next update! I was happy to finally get some action in with the Empress but, I'm not very good at action stuff and I've decided to put in a villain for this story and he's a real Batman villain, just not one used by Nolan. Anyway, **

**good? Bad? Lemme know!  
**


	5. Chapter 5

**Chapter 5**

Hearing a loud knock on her office door, Amelia was startled from her thoughts. It was almost lunch break, and she really didn't want to be summoned into some meeting right now. She told the person to come in, and waited for the door to open, and close before turning around in her chair. She was very surprised to see Bruce standing there with a brown bag, that smelled delicious to her.

He crossed over to her desk and sat down in the large armchair across from her desk.

"Your assistant told me you hadn't been to lunch yet, thought you might be hungry." He said, emptying the contents of the bag. Much to her delight, it was filled with delicious looking Chinese food.

"Conversing with my secretary, I see." She told him, greedily grabbing one of the boxes to find one of her favorites; General Tso's chicken.

"Only a few times. It only took me a little bit of flirting to get her to tell me what kind of Chinese you like." After working with Violet for almost three weeks, and having her run out to get General Tso's a few times in those almost three weeks, she certainly hoped Violet knew what she liked. Bruce handed her a pair of chopsticks before digging into his own orange chicken.

"So what brings you to my neck of the woods?"

"Just got a little bored at the office and decided to get out for a bit."

"So, you just left. I see." Amelia shook her head.

"Have you heard about this new 'vigilantress'?" He made air-quotes with his fingers.

"Empress? Yeah. What about her?"

"How do you feel about another citizen dressing up and fighting crime?"

"I think she's just here to help. I really don't have a problem with it, as long as it helps clean up the streets. It might give a bigger ray of hope; added to that the batman has already put out. I'm no feminist, but it's nice to know that even a girl can stand up for rights and justice too." Amelia explained, trying to sound like a girl with an opinion, rather than the vigilantress herself.

"What about Batman?"

"I think his intentions are good. I think he's done a lot to help the city, from what I've heard. I think the two vigilantes want the same thing. They want justice, and they want crime to stop." Bruce nodded in agreement, actually hearing someone agree with him, when it wasn't Alfred or Lucius, was nice. It almost made him suspicious, but he didn't really think a lady like her went out around in the night a beat up random men.

"Are you ready for the fundraiser tomorrow?"

"Yes, I just sent in the check yesterday. One thing I'll never get used to though, talking to all these hoity-toity people. They drive me crazy."

"Some of them are nice."

"And some of them just want their name in recognition to keep up their charitable place in society."

"Point taken."

"I'm sorry. I'm not usually this irritable, but I forgot to mail Ryan my divorce papers and now he's coming here from California to get them and I'm stressing out."

"Why are you stressing about it?"

"Because, any time he's near me, he finds some new way to tear me down and make me feel the worst about myself."

"You shouldn't let him do that to you." Bruce told her sympathetically. He had set down his food and was giving her his full attention.

"I know. Everyone's told me that, even I've told myself that. I always say, 'Next time he's not going to get to me. I won't let him.' but he always does. The bastard knows how to get under anyone's skin." She said, laughing trying to cover up how upset even thinking about him made her.

"When's he going to be here?" She saw Bruce clench his fist, he really did not like Ryan.

"Any minute. You don't have to be here if you don't want to. I don't want you to get caught in the middle of all this."

"No, no. I want to meet him."

"Well, if it ain't Ms. Mary-Sue." Ryan came bursting through the door, with a smug grin.

"I'm sorry Amelia, I told him he wasn't aloud in until after your lunch break." Violet pleaded, she sounded close to tears; thinking Amelia was going to lash out and fire her.

"It's fine, Violet. It's just my ex-husband." Violet nodded and practically ran back to her desk

"Aw, babe, don't look so depressed. We're still technically married. Who's your guest?" Ryan asked in a mock interested sort of voice.

"Bruce Wayne." Bruce got up and turned around to look this guy in the eyes. He didn't like him. At all.

"Ah, so the little slut's tapping the playboy. How nice."

"You're just here to get the papers. No need to insult my friends." Amelia told him passively, looking through her desk to find the papers. _Where are they? _

"Gee, Emma, you're lookin' a little pudgy. You've really let yourself go." Amelia looked up from searching for the papers and her expression changed from livid back to passive, but Bruce could see the desperation in her eyes, and how hard she was trying not to cry.

"I think I left your papers at my house. I'll be right back." Amelia tried to keep her voice from cracking. "If you two will behave."

"But of course, dear wifey." Ryan replied cockily. "So, you and Amelia shagging yet?"

"Excuse me?" Bruce asked, _This guy has nerve._ "No. I have boundaries. I don't 'shag' my friends, as you so pleasantly put it."

"Okay. We'll play your game."

"I'm not playing a game. I have a lot of respect for Amelia."

"Yeah. We all know that means you just wanna shag her. I had a lot of respect for her too. We met and went out in highschool when she was a senior. She was a little...Feisty back then. We shagged, a _lot._" Ryan started with a smug tone in his voice; more so than usual "One night we didn't have any protection, and she got pregnant. It was funny really, I convinced her she'd be a terrible mom, and she gave it up for adoption. After that she got really depressed and tried to overdose on sleeping pills and ended up going into a coma. She didn't remember anything that happened in that past year so, when we met again she thought she just met me and we got married again. It was a little pathetic, and I really only got enjoyment out of tearing her down and shagging her." Bruce's gaze hardened and his hands balled into a fist. This was going to take more control than he initially planned. He could imagine Amelia, blissfully unaware of this child that she supposedly had.

"I can't believe I threw the papers away." Amelia berated herself. She had accidentally thrown the papers away when she cleaned out her briefcase that morning. The five minute drive from her home to her office felt like a lifetime. She half expected to walk in seeing Bruce beating Ryan to a bloody pulp; which she hoped was happening. But walking up to her office doors she heard nothing. When she went in, she saw Bruce throwing away the Chinese food boxes - and could tell he was mad - and saw Ryan behind her desk with his feet on it, as if he owned it. "Ryan, get your feet off of my desk. Here's your papers. Take them and please leave."

"It was a lovely experience dear wife, maybe you'll wise up and come back to me." Ryan said walking to the door.

"Doubtful. Have a nice life."

"Likewise." As soon as the door closed, the room was left with an uncomfortable silence, and Amelia couldn't help but feel Ryan said something to set Bruce off. He had been tense since she came back into the office.

"I should, um, get back to...Yeah." Bruce said awkwardly, making his way to the door.

"Yeah. Me too. Thanks for lunch. I'm sorry for anything Ryan said or did." Amelia apologized, sitting down at her desk. Bruce just nodded and closed the door behind him when he left, Amelia put her head in her hands and willed the tears forming in her eyes to go away. But she couldn't will them away and for some reason she couldn't explain, she sobbed. Harder than she thought she ever had in her lifetime.

Bruce stood outside the door listening to her sobbing. There was nothing he could do, he couldn't comfort anyone to save his life, and he knew that if he went in there he'd probably tell her everything that Ryan told him, and that would kill her. It would kill anyone. Maybe he'd have the opportunity to talk to her about it later but for now, it was better left unsaid.

It was the first time in the five years her father had been gone that she wished one of her parents were there to comfort her. But, she knew she only had Regina, and she was at home. Amelia heard a soft knock on her door and whispered 'Come in', and saw Kara walk in out of the corner of her eye.

"Amelia, you can take the rest of the day off. I'll handle the meeting later this afternoon." Kara told her sympathetically.

"No, I have to tough it out."

"Amelia, sometimes a girl just needs a good cry. Go home, make something with chocolate in it, get a box of tissues, and turn on a chick flick that pulls on the heartstrings and cry your eyes out; it was my mother's solution to any girl troubles." Amelia looked up at Kara through the hair that had fallen in her face and smiled weakly.

"Thank you." She said, standing up. Kara gave her new friend a small hug before sending her off to her own home.

Amelia was perfectly fine to sit in her own sorrow; but eventually decided around eleven that she needed to go out, so she went down to her basement after setting the alarm, and put on her suit; preparing for the worst, considering this wasn't a very good day for her.

**A/N: There you have it! I know the idea of her going into a coma and blah blah blah sounds lame, but I looked it up, it is possible. I try to be really thorough when I'm making up scenarios. You can go into a coma form sleeping pills, and you can get amnesia from going into a coma.**

**Anyway, I hope you enjoyed!**

**Good? Bad? Lemme know!  
**


	6. Chapter 6

**Chapter 6**

A worn-out and slightly beaten Amelia walked into her house around four that morning. She had gotten into it with another member of the mob that night, and this time Batman hadn't come to investigate. There were a lot more guys, and a lot more weapons. She had knocked out three of the six and was sliced at the thigh with a knife before retreating and calling the police, telling them the location of the knocked out thugs. She was going to have a nasty bruise on her face, and probably on her sides where she had gotten kicked. After she bandaged her thigh and taped ice packs to her sides, she took a pain killer and called the office to tell them she'd hopefully be in by lunch time.

She changed out of her suit and put on a fresh pair of pajamas from her laundry room, right next to the safe room. She was too tired to even make it to her room, so she decided to just crash on the couch, and she was out as soon as her head hit the pillow.

Amelia woke up that afternoon to the sound of her phone ringing, but missed it by the time she got up to answer it. Ignoring it, she looked at the clock to see it was twelve thirty and decided she should get ready for work, putting on extra makeup on her forehead to hide the bruise. Checking her answering machine, she was happy that she ignored it; considering it was a sales call for natural enhancements.

It wasn't until she entered her building that she remembered that she hadn't eaten lunch, and was about to ask Violet to get her something before she entered her office and found a chicken caesar salad sitting on her desk with a note on top of it with a watermark that she recognized as Wayne Enterprises. She picked it up and it read:

_'Thought you might like some lunch, Violet said you hadn't been in yet today. Sorry about yesterday. See you tonight. -Bruce'_

She smiled to herself, but winced when she sat down; momentarily forgetting about her injuries. She have to be careful tonight.

~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~

By the time the party came around, Amelia had barely enough time to redress her wound and put cover up on top of the scars on her face and bare arms before she made her way back over to the office to be picked up. She had put on her black dress that she had bought last week and decided to curl her hair and put it into a bun with a few pieces hanging out behind her right ear. She had silver tear-drop earrings with pearls in the middle and a small diamond necklace with the same cut as her earrings. She heard the elevator doors open and eventually close and tried to look nonchalant and not nervous as ever as she heard the even footsteps of someone walking down the long hallway to her office. She heard a knocking on her door and went to open it revealing an older gentleman in a nice black suit.

"Miss Bennet, I presume?" She nodded. "Alfred Pennyworth, Mr. Wayne's butler, I'll be taking you to the car waiting downstairs. Master Wayne is still a little groggy from a nap and I insisted on walking you down." He mentioned cheerily, outstretching his arm for her to take.

"Thank you Mr. Pennyworth." She said, taking his outstretched arm.

"Alfred, please,"

"Then, by all means, call me Amelia." She requested, pressing the down button and stepped into the waiting elevator.

"Very well, Miss Amelia." Amelia smiled, and fished her keys out of her clutch to lock the lock on the front door; not bothering to lock the bolt for the cleaning people that would be coming in, in about half an hour. Alfred opened the door for her, revealing an exhausted looking Bruce Wayne, trying his best to conceal it.

"Mr. Wayne, if you were too tired to go tonight, you could have called and I would have found another date." Amelia suggested, sliding into the car. She saw his casual grin falter for half a second before he straightened himself and cleared his throat.

"Bruce, and of course not, I think the city deserves at least _some _of my fortune." Amelia nodded in silent acknowledgment, and shifted awkwardly; he sounded so...Arrogant when he said it, almost as if it were a chore to give up some of his millions. Where was the nice man she had been conversing with over the past few weeks?

The ride to Wayne Manor was a long one; and was mostly spent in an awkward silence, only broken when small talk was made. When they finally pulled up the driveway of the enormous mansion, Amelia took Bruce's arm and hid her displeasure of his attitude behind a charming smile; one she had perfected over the years, especially after the gossip of her not being able to handle the company after her father's death. True, it started out rocky and was about to lose everything before, by some unexplainable force, the company picked back up and became the success it is today.

She could feel everyone's eyes on herself and Bruce as they entered his large home; most of which were not friendly stares. What from random girls' stares that read something like: 'What does she have that I don't?' to various mens' stares that were piercing her as if trying to read her true intentions of showing up with Bruce.

For a little while, Bruce stayed by Amelia's side, but eventually disappeared and didn't come back for a while. During that time, however, Gordon approached Amelia.

"The Gotham Police Department would like to thank you personally for your very generous donation, and would like to put your name in the memorial as a thank you."

"That's very kind, Commissioner. But, I think a simple thank you card will suffice. I don't want my name on anything; I don't deserve it, I'm just doing what's right. So please, no name."

"You're a very humble girl, Miss Bennet."

"I try, Commissioner." The rest of her time was spent in comfortable conversation with random people that approached her.

"Hi, I'm officer Franklin, I was sent to socialize with the guests." A joking voice says into her ear as she was grabbing a drink from the bar. She usually didn't permit herself to drink, but she told herself that Empress could wait tonight.

"Officer Franklin." Amelia acknowledges him; recognizing him as the officer who 'professed' his 'love' to Empress her first night out, but continued to act oblivious, shaking his hand. "Amelia Bennet, but you can call me Amelia."

"Please, call me Tyler. I heard you were escorted here by the infamous playboy; Bruce Wayne himself?" He asked her; as she explained, she also took time to look at the young man, who she would soon come to learn was older than her by four months, she noticed that he was very attractive. Almost took on a look of Ryan Gosling, which she admired. He looked like Ryan Gosling had in _The Notebook. _

"You are correct, but, he seems to have gone missing." She shrugs nonchalantly. The rest of their conversation continued on talking about whatever came to one another's mind. She thought she detected some flirting, but she returned it with equal fervor so, no one was to blame. "Excuse me." She excused herself to hunt down the restroom in the massive home, and ran into Bruce on her way there.

"I'm sorry I've been missing but, something has come up at work and I have to go to Wayne Enterprises immediately." He said stiffly to her; as if he weren't telling her the whole story. She reluctantly told him that it was fine and told him goodbye before making her way back into the party looking as if nothing happened. The party she had been looking forward to for almost two weeks was just flopping. _Oh get over it. He's a playboy; he doesn't have time to spend every minute doting on you. He has just been being nice these past few weeks._ She thinks to herself.

"Tyler, what do you say about going out to lunch sometime this week?" She asks him, she didn't really know what she was doing but she realized she just wanted more friends in Gotham. He agrees quickly and they plan for next week at a local sandwich shop for a casual lunch. She gives him her cell phone and work number in case he needs anything, and she decides it would be a good idea for her to leave; considering it's eleven, and she has an early meeting in the morning.

"Do you need a ride?" Tyler offered. She was ready to decline but realized that Bruce - or rather Alfred - picked her up so, she agreed and he led her over to his Honda Civic. The long ride to her home is spent in a comfortable silence while the radio played the top forty songs, and Amelia passed the time by admiring the buildings passing by. Gotham was such a pretty town when you were speeding away from it or into, but, when you got out of the car you see the real Gotham, a broken, slummy, corrupt town.

"Thank you, for the ride. I hope it wasn't too far out of the way." She tells him, unclicking her seat belt, preparing to exit the car.

"No, I live about fifteen minutes out from here, actually." He said to her, looking slightly awkward.

"Well, now I don't feel so bad." She joked to him, while opening the car door. "See you next week!"

"Hopefully sooner?" He winks, she feels her face flush, smiles, and nods closing the door. He waits to make sure she actually gets into the door before driving off and she lets out a breath and a nervous laugh she was not aware she was harboring. She felt an odd swelling in her chest and realized how good it felt to be admired again.

She went to bed after throwing her hair up in a messy bun, changing into pajamas, and washing her face; anticipating the next week yet again, hoping she wouldn't be disappointed this time.

**A/N: Okay, soo, this is not what I planned for this chapter but I knew everything couldn't go as planned or it wouldn't be a good fic. So, I did this. Don't hate me! It is and will always be a Bruce/OFC fic, I just have these things in between. Believe me, everything works out and it'll all -hopefully- fit in together.**

**I'd like to say that things will be picking up in the next few chapters but, I really don't know where these characters are taking me. It's like they have minds of their own.**

**I hope you enjoyed it!**

**Good? Bad? Lemme know!  
**


	7. Chapter 7

**Chapter 7**

After trying, and failing to fall asleep, Amelia decided around one to go out to the living room and try to watch some TV. She had decided she wanted something lighter in subject than the news, but the remote was missing and she was too tired to sit there and change the channel until she found something agreeable so, news it was.

She watched the ending of a subject that she didn't catch the name of about breakfast foods; stupid time fillers until the big story came on, and watched as they showed various blurred pictures of Batman. Amelia decided this was semi important, so she got up and turned up the volume more.

'...Was reported to us a few minutes ago that our very own masked vigilante had a tough time tonight, and had appeared to be a little roughed up by a possible new threat to Gotham city, the only thing we know at the moment is, there was a lot of fire, and a lot of damage from those fires. Where was our masked vigilantress, we might ask? Hopefully not heading for the hills since, we all know, Gotham criminals are not your average criminals...'

The newscaster drawled on and Amelia couldn't help but feel a little insulted that they think she would run away after about a week as a vigilantress in the city. She's dealt with bad cities, and she heard Gotham was the worst but, she's tougher than she looks.

Watching the end of a few more boring segments, she turned off the t.v. and tried to go back to sleep.

~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~

Waking up the next morning, Amelia was not a happy camper. She didn't hear her alarm, so she was late getting to work and forgot to eat breakfast. When she got to the office, the meeting started on time - thankfully - but had run over so she was late to go get lunch and was convinced everyone in the meeting room could hear her stomach.

She opted to go get a salad from Wendy's instead of waiting for a gourmet salad, '_Not that gourmet salads are any better tasting than fast food salads.' _And returned to work in a hurry trying to finish the paper work she missed out on when she was late. She was a very active person in her own business, that's the way her dad had always been, she didn't just run the company and then sit in her office and play solitaire all the time; like some other owners she had previously met with in other cities.

She was just starting her work when she heard a strong knock at her door and she replied come-in without ceasing to type on her computer, she half expected it to be Tyler, but was surprised to find Bruce Wayne standing in her doorway. She plastered on the most pleasing smile she could and greeted him, asking him to sit down - hoping he would decline. He took the seat gladly and proceeded to ask her how she was.

"I'm fine. Just a little stressed." She said; trying to make her discomfort known.

"Is there something wrong?" He leaned forward, looking concerned - or afraid, Amelia couldn't decide which.

"I don't know Bruce, I'm just a little upset about being persisted to go to a party with you, and you disappear within the first hour." Amelia deadpanned, frustrated at how oblivious he was acting about the whole situation. Did he really not know how uncomfortable she felt being at a billionaire's house with random people she didn't know, who were also silently judging her for showing up with him in the first place?

"I thought it would be nice for you to meet people." He tried to cover for himself. She seemed convinced but she didn't buy the excuse.

"How could you do that when you know I'm new in town and you're the only person I know here other than my co-workers!" She finally looked up at him from typing, was he really so stupid? "You could have at _least _introduced me to people."

"Look I'm sorry about that, but I had important business to attend to."

"Great excuse." She gave him the most incredulous look she could muster. "You really don't think I've tried that excuse to get out of numerous birthday parties I've been forced to be the center of attention of?"

"Okay, then let me make it up to you, go to lunch next Friday?"

"I'm afraid I have a previous affair Mr. Wayne." She mentioned, referring to her lunch with Tyler. "Now if you don't mind _I _have important business to attend to." Amelia grabbed a stack of folders and walked toward the door; with Bruce in tow. She opened the door and waited for him to walk out before walking out herself, and closing the door behind her; heading for the meeting room down the hall. She swiped her access key and watched as Bruce entered the elevator and turned around looking like a mixture of angry and dejected before the doors closed.

Amelia could admit it, she felt a little bad for acting so coldly towards him, but seriously, he persisted her about going to the party, and then ditches her. Not to mention the fact that he had acted so nicely to her at first, then completely changed his persona, like he was a different person. Amelia's feelings were torn. Yes, her feelings for Bruce were a little more than on the friends level, but part of her felt that he deserved how she treated him. She'd decided to meditate on those thoughts and see how she felt the next day.

Exiting her building she was getting off later than usual, she was used to getting off around dinner-time, but was called into a last minute meeting and stayed until after eight and ended up getting fast food for dinner instead of going out to a nice place, as she initially planned.

~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~

Out on her patrol, Amelia was a little shocked to see ominous clouds of smoke a little outside of the city, near the suburbs but not all the way out to the Palisades. Amelia geared up and headed out to where the smoke was coming from, trying to follow it's path the best she could.

She was on the rooftop of a nearby building trying to see anything she could on where the smoke was coming from, when she felt a presence behind her. She turned around to see Batman looking down on all of the action with her.

"Do you know what's going on?" She asked, the man she had no clue she had just yelled at just a few hours earlier, in her fake voice.

"He's some kind of pyromaniac, but he's not at large yet." He replied in his equally fake voice.

"C'mon boys it's time to come in with a bang!" A voice, that sounded somewhat familiar to both persons on the roof, shouted to a group that had yet to make their presence known. They heard an array of different voices all shouting together, and proceeded to hear footsteps enter a building.

"I heard you had a rough night yesterday." Amelia commented. Batman stopped focusing on what he was doing and turned to her.

"You could say that. I ran into this guy and he threw a little fire at me, the news thought it was more mob members but I think this guy is more. He also had some kind of poison that makes you think you're burning that I heard him discussing with his henchmen."

"Well, let's go. We have a lot of ground to cover."

"'We'?"

"Yes. I certainly can't beat him myself, and I'm not going to make a competition out of this. Not to mention it'd be easier to catch him if we work together." Batman was still skeptical looking so Empress elaborated. "Listen, I'm not going to ask about your personal life, nor are you going to ask about mine. I don't want to see where you work, nor are you going to want to see mine. If you need information you could call me and vice-versa, but other than that we both have lives outside of our jobs that need to be kept a secret."

"Fine, let's go." He said gruffly, grabbing her around the waist and hooking her up to his utility belt. She was about to ask what he was doing when he told her to lift her legs up and he started running toward that edge of building lifting them off into the night sky.

"I've got to get me some of these." She said - referring to his wings - after landing a few blocks from the building, to an old burnt down one. "This was where the smoke was coming from." She deduced.

"Yes. He might have left a clue as to who he is in the rubble." They started looking around. After a while, Batman found a piece of paper shoved into a book about insects and pulled the book open, examining the paper.

"It says 'I think we should call it your grave.'" She pondered on it for a minute, and replied. "'Ah, curse your sudden but inevitable betrayal.'" Batman looked at her strangely. "Firefly, it was a show. Wait, what insect was the paper found on?" She looked at Batman.

"A firefly."

"Bingo. And we have our criminal."

"It certainly explains the whole pyromaniac thing." Batman commented, half amused and half mockingly in the lack of masculinity _and _originality. _'Even Empress is a more intimidating name than Firefly.'_

"So, what do we do now?" Empress eyed him, half expecting him to belittle her for using 'we' again.

"We wait." He said, making his way over to a ladder to take them back to their vehicles.

**A/N: o0o0o0o0o0o0o Let's see what happens next week :3 XD**

**Good? Bad? Lemme know!  
**


	8. Chapter 8  BIRTHDAY UPDATE!

**Chapter 8**

Amelia's lunch with Tyler was nice, but she couldn't help but think something was missing. The was simply an air of familiarity when she did things with Bruce.

And it's not because Bruce seemed to give Amelia his undivided attention, - which he seems to do a lot, she's coming to realize - because she likes hearing about other people's lives and days. And it wasn't because they didn't go somewhere too fancy - opting for Olive Garden - because she liked the simplicity of not having to wear her fanciest skirt-suit to work.

"I had a really nice time, Tyler." She told him as he walked her into her office.

"Let's do it again sometime." He suggested, while she just smiled and nodded in agreement.

x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x

**(This happens at the same time the above events are happening)**

Bruce enters his office tiredly after a long night of trying to dig up information about 'Firefly', only to recover what he already knew, and proceeded to come in for an improv meeting at nine this morning.

After only getting three hours of sleep, it was safe to say that he was not in the greatest of moods, and he couldn't help when his thoughts drifted towards a certain business owner that had turned him down for lunch.

Part of him hoped she had a terrible time -mainly because of jealousy- and part of him hated himself for thinking that. It was true, it's his own fault that she's mad. He could help but think he had to do something, make her not mad at him again, but also had a feeling of helplessness, like he couldn't do anything about it. He was also a little suspicious of Tyler. Not only the fact that couldn't trust the majority of Gotham's policemen, but the way he just warmed up to her and weaseled his way into everything, it was just suspicious. He knew it was playing it close to the chest, but he was going to follow Tyler around. Not just for his benefit, but for Amelia's safety.

"Mr. Wayne, Ms. Bennet dropped by while you were in a meeting and left her day planner here. I though you might want to drop it off at her office." His secretary interrupted his train of thought. _'And yet, the world stays -somewhat- fair.' _

"I'll do that, thank you, Victoria."

Walking up the steps of Amelia's office, Bruce was hoping he would catch Tyler before he left so he could place a tracking device on his clothing, and one on his hand because he was sure he was going to change his clothing sometime soon. The tracking device itself was about as small as a flea, and had one sticky side on it that would stick to just about anything including, cars, clothes, skin, electronics, and various other things. It was a new thing Lucius had proposed for Batman, but it was too small and had to be placed just right, luckily for Bruce, Lucius had kept a few prototypes that Bruce took the liberty of 'borrowing'. He was sure he looked like a fool, but he couldn't mess this one up so; with both palms facing up with each tracking device secured on top of them, and Amelia's datebook tucked securely under his arm, he entered the building just in time to run into Tyler.

"Officer Franklin, haven't seen you since the fundraiser. How have you been?" He swiftly shook his hand, attaching the first device, and patting him on the back, attaching the second. Adding of course his signature smile, just to lighten things up.

"Ah, Mr. Wayne good to see you. I've been fine thanks. Listen, I've got to run, see you 'round." Bruce nodded and headed toward the elevator to take him up to the twenty-fifth floor; where Amelia's office was.

"Good afternoon, Mr. Wayne." Violet greeted, almost too excitedly, Bruce noted.

"Afternoon, Violet. Is Amelia in?" Bruce again put on his heart-melting smile.

"She just got in, you can go in." She replied with a slight blush.

Amelia was expecting Tyler to come back in, thinking he had forgotten something, but when she looked up from her mail she was -maybe not so- pleasantly surprised to see Bruce standing there; with her date book no less.

She had forgotten she left it there, she had gone over there to apologize for being so cold, only to find out he was in an important meeting, and she would have been late to lunch if she hadn't left, after waiting a solid ten minutes.

"You left this at the office." He told her somewhat awkwardly after setting it in front of her.

"Thank you, Bruce." She told him genuinely, "Please, sit. The reason I went to your office was to apologize for acting so coldly toward you last week. I realize now that our friendship is more important than to get upset about a stupid party." Bruce internally winced at the word 'friendship', he wasn't too used to the feeling of being in the 'friend zone' with women.

"It's completely fine, I am sorry about running out like that, but you have to trust me when I tell you I had business to attend to." Amelia nodded in understanding, not sure if she really believed him or not.

~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~

After all was said and done, and Amelia and Bruce were on speaking terms again. (After a lot of flirting and persuading Amelia to go to lunch with Bruce next Monday -which she agreed to- on Bruce's part.)

She tried to do work, but she was torn between her feelings. It seemed that Bruce had feelings for her, but Tyler had feelings for her also, and she didn't know what to do. If the choice were to come along, she would have a hard time choosing between each man. Both were great guys, Bruce was cool, collected, attractive, while Tyler was spontaneous, edgy, and chivalrous.

Feeling emotionally exhausted, Amelia turned on her small ten-inch TV, that sat behind her desk, only to find it on the news -as per usual- and feeling too lazy to change the channel. (Also trying to avoid soap operas)

'...Seems our own Bruce Wayne's, and native of California, Amelia Bennet's short fling is over. It looked as though each business owners were quite cozy since Amelia's little temper tantrum at local restaurant 'Criterion', The couple had been seen to a few lunches and a dinner, and finally a fundraiser for the rebuilding of the Gotham General Hospital, where their romance seems to have ended. We caught Ms. Bennet leaving in the car of a local Gotham Police Department officer, Tyler Franklin, where the couple had been seen at lunch today looking like more than friends. It seems Amelia has moved on quite quickly, or has she? Newscasters have just informed me that just fifteen minutes ago, Mr. Wayne was seen leaving 'Bennet & Sons', -or should we say 'Daughters'- looking quite pleased with himself. Could this sweet girl from Santa Barbara be a player? Or is she just maintaining several close friendships at once? Only time will tell. In other news, it seems that our infamous vigilante known as 'Batman' has been spotted, by an anonymous source, working with our newest partners in the crime fighting business; the vigilantress known as 'Empress'. Are our vigilantes getting cozy with each other as our business rivals are as well? We'll figure that ou-'

Amelia promptly shut off the TV, annoyed with the assumptions of the gossipers of any town she's visited -seeing how she rolled her eyes countless times during the entire newscast. She also caught herself wondering what Bruce thought of the rumors concerning the two of them, not even thinking of what Tyler would think.

Apparently, no one could just be friends with anyone in Gotham if they're important enough to be on the news. Not even their vigilantes. The whole city was like a millionaire matchmaker or something, she was convinced.

~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~

Bruce -or rather, Batman- was thoroughly confused as to where the trackers were leading him. After leaving Amelia's office, he took the rest of the day off to follow Tyler around. He followed him to a regular hardware store where Tyler bought a lot of kerosene and matches; he thought nothing of it considering it was still cold from a particularly bad Gotham winter.

After that, Tyler spent the rest of his time at his residency. Bruce wasn't going to go look through his windows or anything, but detected that he was moving around a lot, from what he saw of it. He also noticed the basement lights turning on and off and random sparks also flying from the small, frosted glass, window that was provided a look into the basement.

Now he was leading Empress around back alleys in the Narrows, trying to follow Tyler's trail.

"Where are we going, Batman?" Empress questioned, trying to keep up with Batman's fast pace. Batman didn't answer and he noticed she put her head down in an ashamed fashion.

"I'm following a trail." He answered as if substituting it for 'I'm hot on a trail, don't bother me.'

It was odd, the trail was leading him to where he and Empress teamed up, just those few nights before. He donned his sonar goggles over his signature cowl, and looked into the building. From where he last looked at the place where the tracker said Tlyer was, which had indicated he stopped moving, was exactly where the sonar detected a man with a strange jumpsuit sort of outfit with a double 'F' in gold, which also had an insect in the face mask.

It didn't take Bruce long to piece these things together. The double 'F' and the insect that resembled a firefly, this was their new criminal. But then, the tracker...There was no way Tyler could have passed the tracker on. Once it was on the skin, it stuck. So, Firefly was Tyler. Tyler was...No.

"Empress-" He started, but stopped as soon as he heard a feminine gasp behind him. He was mid turn before he heard her scream.

"BATMAN WATCH OUT!" Before he felt a searing pain on his face near his forehead, and blacked out.

**A/N: So, since I'm officially 16 today, I decided to be a good little authoress -since you guys are such devoted readers- and give you an early update, since I was so ahead on chapters. (Don't worry, there'll be one on Wednesday too!) Anyway, I only did spell check, I didn't read through the entire chapter because to tell the truth, I went to bed at five in the morning, and got up at 8 Am so, I'm a little tired. I'll read it tomorrow and fix my mistakes. **

**Oh, and about my other two stories, 'Raven' (TDK) and 'The Hit...Woman' (Inception), I've got no clue what I'm going to with those stories...I've kind of lost inspiration and ideas so, I'll keep them up in case I get an epiphany of some sort but, I think for now they're a lsot cause...*Tears* **

**Anywho, I hope you enjoyed!**

**Good? Bad? Lemme know!  
**


	9. Chapter 9

**Chapter 9**

**A/N: Just to clear the air, this story is pure Nolan-verse, which means it's set near Chicago. -as Chris Nolan has confirmed himself (According to Wikipedia.) Therefore, it will not be set in New York. If I wanted it to be set in New York, I would have put it in a different Batman category. But as it is, it's in the 'Batman Begins/Dark Night' category signifying that it's Nolan-verse.**

**Also, if you didn't get the E-mail Sunday, don't forget to read chapter 8! It was special birthday update!  
**

**Enjoy (:**

Empress was a wreck, her whole world turned to chaos after one of the Firefly's henchmen threw a flaming ball of some sort -succeeding in knocking Batman out, though he didn't set him on fire as he intended, he successfully burnt part of his forehead. Empress made quick work of releasing a few batarangs from Batman's utility belt, refusing to leave his side, and lodging them in various places in the henchmen's body. When the henchman was laying on the ground in pain, the Empress decided to pinch one of his pressure points long enough to make him pass out, and bound him to a nearby pole before contacting the police.

She didn't know where her strength was coming from, but she found it in her somewhere to drag him about a block and a half into an empty warehouse where she simply waited for him to wake up, considering that's all she could do, and tried to make him as comfortable as she could; putting his head on her lap.

~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~

In about a half an hour, Empress had already watched the police haul away the henchman, and search the warehouse -not to Empress' surprise, they didn't find anything other than the leftover evidence of whatever hit Batman's head, which Empress conveniently didn't tell the police that Batman was unconscious a block away in a dingy warehouse.

Shortly after the police left, Empress went back to where Batman was slowly coming to.

"Amelia..." He slowly murmured before letting his head hit the cement again, Empress noticed he was only sleeping this time around.

Empress was completely stunned. He said her name. First of all, who was this man? Second of all, did he know about her true identity? He came to in a couple more minutes; a living hell for Empress.

"Are you okay?" She asked, kneeling down, setting his head on her lap, as it was before. She momentarily forgot to disguise her voice, she was so worried. "I need to see your burn." She said, reaching for the cowl.

"No." He said defiantly, placing his hands on the mask as if he were a five year old about to get his teddy bear taken away.

"You said 'Amelia', who is she?" She asked, half trying to lighten the mood, and half trying to see if she could detect who he was. She suspected he momentarily forgot who he was with his reply.

"This amazing woman who I seem to piss off a lot." She could detect the level of joking in his voice and even thought she saw a ghost of a smile on his face.

Then it hit her. The only man she could go from hating one minute back to liking the next was Bruce. The realization wanted to make her faint. It was obvious that it had to be Bruce. She only really knew two men in this city and that was Tyler, who had never -yet- pissed her off, and Bruce who _always _pisses her off. She just couldn't believe the way their whole lives were soon intertwining.

"Bruce?" She whispered, case someone was watching. The way he shot up was almost as if he had seen an intruder enter, and she started looking around, to try and see if someone actually had.

"It isn't safe here." He said in his Batman voice again.

"Well, if you are who I think you are, my house is closer. Follow me."

When they arrived at her home, she directed them straight to her 'lair'. When she sat him down in a chair, she noticed his burn started bleeding again. She went to patch it up but his cowl was in the way, and her hair was in her face. She threw off her wig and her mask -along with the wig cap keeping her natural hair up- and asked if he would take off the cowl. At first, he sat there staring at her; as if he didn't believe that Empress could be Amelia.

"Bruce, it's me. We've clarified this, can you please take off the cowl so I can help you?" She tried to calm herself. The whirlwind of emotion going on was stifling, but she decided it was best to save that for later. By the time she had gotten the medical supplies she needed Bruce had finally taken off the cowl and was just staring at her, trying to take it all in. He had stayed silent this whole time, and she couldn't help but feel he was figuring out a way for her to forget or a way to stop keeping contact with her. Truth was, all he could think about was the way to tell her that as well as them both being vigilantes, her newest flame was also an uprising criminal. "So, this was the big business you had to attend to at your fundraiser?" She asked almost guiltily. He just nodded as she dabbed his face with antiseptic. "I'm sorry." She said, looking into his eyes. He caught her wrist that had finished putting a band-aid on, and he didn't know what possessed him to do so, but, he caught her lips with his own in a short but sweet lip lock.

"You shouldn't have to apologize." He said, gently touching his forehead to hers. "But there is another thing I need to tell you."

"What is it?" She asked, pulling her face away to look at him fully. Being at that close of a proximity was too tempting while she was working.

"Tyler is...Firefly." Amelia's eyes widened in surprise -with a hint of disbelief. "I put a tracking device on him this afternoon and, it led me straight to him tonight."

"Well, I guess it's good to hear about this now...?" She said somewhat jokingly. "I don't know about you, but I'm not going anywhere tonight. You're welcome to stay here tonight. But I only have one bed, and a couch. You're welcome to either."

"I'll take the couch, I don't want to inconvenience you. But I don't have an extra set of clothes." He said, shifting awkwardly.

"Whoever said that would be a problem?" She joked as she went into the laundry room to find that extra big shirt she had, leftover from Ryan -she really had meant to burn that a while ago. When she turned around from looking in a basket, she gasped when she spotted Bruce behind her. He trapped her in between him and the washing machine and took hold of her lips with his own again in a longer, more passionate kiss; with a hint of possessiveness.

Somewhere in the midst of the night, they had both lost their suits and would be found on Amelia's bed; Bruce in nothing but a black plaid pair of boxer shorts, and Amelia left in a silk camisole and matching panties. Bruce's arm was wound around her waist possessively and his face buried in her hair, and she was sleeping with a smile on her face.

~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~

When Bruce awoke the next morning, he was not in his own bed, he noticed, and not even in his own home. Then, all of last night's events flooded back into his memory, and he wondered where the young woman who owned the bed he was lounging in could be found.

As he made his way downstairs, her noticed random parts of his suit scattered across part of her bedroom, her hallway, the staircase, and her living room leading to the door to the basement. He tried to collect as much he could throughout each room and placed it all onto the couch when he entered the kitchen and he heard the sizzle of something cooking in the kitchen and made his way in there to find Amelia flipping eggs and moving onto flip bacon in a pan.

"I was going to bring this upstairs." Amelia said when she noticed he came into the room. He just shrugged and sat down at the breakfast bar. "So, I guess this means that I _have _to go to lunch with you on Monday? I was going to try to get out of it." She turned to smile at him and noticed a genuine smile played on his lips as well.

"Nope, looks like you're stuck with me."

"Okay, fine." She shoved the bacon onto a plate, as well as the eggs and set them down next to her on the counter. "But, I still want some of those wings you have mister."

"I don't think so. I don't even want you out there at night anymore." He suddenly turned serious.

"You're only saying that because you know who I am now." She said, scowling as she did so. "I've already proven that I can knock out two of the biggest men I've ever seen, _and _I dragged you around for a block and a half while you were unconscious last night, and no offense, you're not the lightest thing. I'm tougher than you think I am. You're just being overprotective because you've laid a claim on me."

"Alright, alright, I get it." He put his hands up in mock surrender and approached her; trapping her, yet again, in between himself and the counter. "I just don't want you to get hurt." He whispered into er ear, he noticed her shiver under his touch.

"And, if I do, you'll just have to be there to help me." She told him before planting a kiss on his cheek. She thought he was going to kiss her before he reached around her to take a piece of bacon from the plate and went back over to his seat. "Well, you can't go out in the world with just your boxers on, -which I personally would have no problem with- and you certainly can't go out as Batman, considering bats are nocturnal as for a number of other reasons, so I suggest you call up your butler and have him pick you up, Mr. Wayne."

"Later. We need to talk about what to do with Tyler." He said, putting another piece of bacon into his mouth

"Well, we can't really _do _anything; we have no evidence without telling the police you tracked him, which I'm pretty sure is an invasion of privacy, -which doesn't need to be added to your track record- But I think I have an idea." Amelia mentioned, with a mischievous smile. "Let's go down to my lair." She said in a mock evil tone, rubbing her hands together. "That reminds me, I need a more secure way of accessing the part in the basement where I keep all my Empress stuff. Just a book that opens the door and padlock on the carriage house door is not enough to keep a homeless man who may be living in my basement out." She said turning serious, and Bruce quirked an eyebrow at the analogy of a homeless man taking residence in her basement; which wouldn't be _too _unusual, this is Gotham after all.

"I'll get my guy who designed my secondary Batcave on it. Now, about that plan," He said leading her down to the basement

"Ah yes, my master plan. I'll tell you, but you have to promise not to beat Tyler's face in." She said, pointing an accusatory finger at him. He lifted his eyebrows in mock surprise.

"Who me? No never." He said sarcastically.

"Bruce." She said in a somewhat motherly sounding tone, and he nodded his head to agree as she went on to explain her plan.

**A/N: So, here you go, they're finally together XD**

**Anyway, I didn't get to proof read it first because 1. I'm babysitting, and 2. My sleep schedule has been messed up this week so I barely know what I'm typing right now. Therefore, I'll read it later and fix my mistakes.**

**Good? Bad? Lemme know!  
**


	10. Chapter 10

**Chapter 10**

"What I had in mind was I pursue the relationship with Tyler, and see if he'll take me back to his house and I'll distract him somehow to get a look around. I mean, obviously he's not keeping things in that warehouse; I watched the police search it thoroughly." She said excitedly, there was a huge chance that Bruce wasn't going to let her but, she had to try.

"Absolutely not. We don't know what this guy is capable of." Bruce shot down the idea as soon as it left her mouth.

"Bruce, come on. If anything, I'll make him take me to his house and I'll knock him out and say he slipped. I'll even punch him while he's out to give him a bruise." She pleaded wrapping her arms around his neck as if to distract him.

"I can't risk your safety like that. What if everything backfires?" He said, still in his calm, cool voice; as per usual.

"Well, you put a tracker on him right? Just put one on me and follow us around, if anything goes wrong come in and beat him within an inch of his life and we'll tell the police to come search the house or something. We've had this conversation; I'll be fine." She said kissing his nose when he finally sighed and wrapped his arms around her waist, agreeing to it as he did so.

"Fine. But if one thing goes wrong, I'm coming in." He sobered

"Sir yes sir." She agreed, lifting one hand from running her fingers through his to hair to salute him. "If we go through this plan though, we can't be seen going out together to things like lunches and parties. Casual outings, I think we'll be okay for. Therefore, we can't go to lunch Monday, unless we get our plan done sometime this weekend."

"I doubt it, we shouldn't rush into anything. But, since you're canceling our date, you're stuck with me all weekend I'm afraid." He announced as she resumed tousling his hair with her fingers.

"If I have to." She admitted in a mock tone of disgust. She was about to ask how they should execute their plan, when Amelia's phone started ringing. "Hello?" She placed it on speakerphone.

_"Hi, this is Tyler."_

"Hi. How are you?" The apprehensive look on her face alerted Bruce that she really didn't feel comfortable conversing with him after their recent discovery.

_"Good, and you?"_

"Oh, you know. Just lounging. What's up?" She mentioned, somewhat hostile sounding

_"I wanted to know if you wanted to go to lunch sometime this week."_

"Actually, I'm pretty busy with staff evaluations and meetings this week, could we do it say, Monday of next week?" She turned to Bruce for confirmation and he just nodded.

_"Uh, yeah that's fine. Listen, my break's about over, so I have to go."_

"See you next week, bye." She put the phone back on the cradle and walked over to Bruce. He noticed she was nervous and he raised his eyebrows at her. "It's just so weird talking to him, knowing about his extra, ahem, activities. He just seemed like such a nice guy, but I will admit he seemed a little suspicious when he refused to go out to dinner every time I suggested it."

"Honestly, I was afraid to tell you about him at all. Well, not Empress, I was going to tell her before I got knocked out. I was afraid that you, personally, were going to think I was this jealous guy trying to get you to hate him."

"Well, now that I think about it, you are. So, get out." She tried to keep a straight face she told him this, but just couldn't do it and ended up giggling before getting a playful, little, shove from Bruce. "Oh, I forgot. I have to return a few books to the library."

"Let me call Alfred to bring me some clothes and I'll go with you."

"Okay, let me go shower in the meantime." She suggested, heading up the stairs.

By the time Amelia had showered and was dressed, Alfred had been to the house, left one of Bruce's Ferrari's in Amelia's driveway, and gotten a ride home in a taxi.

"I thought it would be better to keep us a secret if I drove separately." He explained, seeing how Amelia was about to ask why Alfred had to go home in a taxi. "What did you have to return?"

"I borrowed a few books on orphanages and how they're run, also what it takes to run them. I'm thinking of opening a new orphanage here in Gotham. I've already donated to the few they have in the city, but I think there needs to be more."

"Wayne Enterprises has been thinking about the same thing, actually. We could open one collaboratively."

"That could work actually, because by then we'll have plenty of sponsors, so tax-payers wouldn't have to pay too much out of pocket for the upkeep. I'll call you about it after I talk to headquarters in California." She continued as she led the way out to her Porsche and his Ferrari.

"Aren't you in charge?" Bruce questioned

"Yes, but I like to have my staff's approval before anything big; it just makes the company run so much better."

The ride to the library was uneventful for both parties, the area that Amelia chose to live in was in between the Narrows and the Palisades; where as the library was on the edge of entering the Narrows. If you wanted to get there in less time, most would prefer surface roads; considering the highway takes you out and around the city to get where you're going. Either way, it takes about five to ten minutes, depending on traffic.

"Are you going to look at anything?" Amelia asked as they entered the spacious lobby of the large, memorial library. Bruce shook his head 'no.' "Would you mind picking me up a cappuccino from the cafe over there, please?" She asked; she could have gotten it herself, but she just wanted to avoid the press seeing them together. So, she would return the books, while he got coffee.

When she got back from slipping the books into the return slot at the front desk, she saw a little girl -about the age of four or five- sitting at the threshold in between the hallway and the entrance way, shoulders shaking, alerting Amelia that she had been crying. She had dark brown hair, in a long style that looked like it hadn't been cut in while, and a paler skin tone. Amelia walked up to her and knelt down to see if she could see if she was okay.

"Sweetie, are you okay?" The little girl looked up from having her head on her knees and Amelia saw that her eyes were stained red.

"No. My b-brother Thomas. I c-can't find h-him." She was in a mix between hyper-ventilating and and hiccuping from extensive crying, Amelia concluded. "I think h-he left w-with his f-f-friends." Amelia saw more tears stream down the little girl's angelic looking face, and her heart throbbed. Ryan had never wanted kids, it was a sacrifice she made for him; it had been her life-long dream to be the typical stay at home mom.

"Where do you live, honey? Will your mommy and daddy be looking for you?" She started rubbing the little girl's back in an effort to make to crying cease.

"I don't k-know w-where we l-live. Mommy left a-a long t-time ago. B-Big men in uni-uniforms took her to a s-safe place. I didn't k-know my d-daddy. We w-were staying i-in the b-basement of a seamstress when we u-used to sleep b-behind the shop." Amelia don't know what possessed her to say the words that came out of her mouth but, she did;

"Do you want to come with me, sweetie? You can stay with me for a little bit, and we'll try to find your big brother." She noticed the girl perk up quite a bit at the mention of her brother. "What's your name? I'm Amelia."

"Sophie. I'm gonna call you Mia." Amelia smiled as the small child got excited about going with her.

Bruce watched the scene unfold as Amelia knelt down, in her unusually casual boot-cut jeans and black fitted v-neck, to see if the little girl was okay, and he couldn't help but smile. He felt an odd feeling in his stomach when she tried to comfort her by rubbing her back, and got a nervous sort of feeling when Amelia picked the little girl up and started walking toward him.

"Bruce, this is Sophie. She's going to stay with me for a little bit until we find her brother." She announced, while looking at him as if to say; 'I'll tell you later.' and took her cappuccino out his hands. "Thanks, Bruce. Are you hungry Sophie?" She watched as the little one nodded her head violently and asked if they could go see 'Ronald McDonald' today, which Amelia agreed to, as did Bruce.

"I think she likes you." Amelia whispered to Bruce; both of which, were sitting across from Sophie, who was munching on her chicken nuggets while also staring intensely at Bruce.

"Think she's psychoanalyzing me." He replied, her stare was like she was piercing his very soul.

"Maybe she can read auras." Amelia joked.

"Are you married to him Mia?" The now cheerful little voice asked curiously from across the booth.

"No, honey, when two people like each other a lot, they date. You have to date before you get married." Amelia tried her best to explain, she'd never had this experience before. She never really babysat; any spare time in her teens was spent watching her father work with an odd fascination like a child who hears footsteps on the roof early Christmas morning.

"Oh, so you're going to get married?" She asked closing the chicken nugget box and moving onto her small bag of french fries. Amelia blushed and Bruce looked down out of embarrassment and Amelia replied -much to Bruce's surprise;

"We'll see." Sophie nodded, accepting Amelia's vague answer. Amelia was about to resume conversation when her phone started ringing.

"Regina?" She answered, she was about to call her. Truthfully, she didn't know what she was going to do with Sophie, there was a fat chance that they were going to find her brother so, she figured she would just take her in until she found someone to take care of her. But that also meant that she needed someone to take care of her while she was out being Empress. Regina had always talked about adopting, but her boyfriend wasn't ready for that commitment. Over the time that Regina was staying in Gotham, she had confessed that she dumped her boyfriend of five years; she got tired of him telling her what she could and couldn't do with her life.

"Is there any way I can stay with you in Gotham?" The way she said it, sounded like she had been upset.

"Of course you can! You know my house is big enough. That's actually perfect because I need your help."

**A/N: So0o0o0o, this chapter didn't really go as I planned, but I'm happy with it. More action in the next couple chapters and hopefully I'll get my act together for a legitimate criminal storyline.**

**Anyway, I hope you all enjoyed I try to put a lot of work and thought into my chapters and I just really hope they turn out. I'm not one for begging for reviews, but if you've just alerted the story, I really appreciate it it shows that you like it. But, I'd also like to hear what you would change about it, and what you don't like about the storyline or characters or plot. If you have anything that you love or hate about it, feel free to tell me. (You can PM me if it's more comfortable.) Just thought I'd let everyone know that their opinion is valued in the highest and I won't hold any hard feelings if you tell me you hate something about my story.**

**Good? Bad? Lemme know!  
**


	11. Chapter 11

**Chapter 11**

Regina Ford arrived in Gotham at midnight that night. She was emotionally and physically exhausted and wanted nothing more than to crash on her best friend, Amelia Bennet's, couch. But was a little shocked to see, waiting for her when she exited the plane, Amelia, -of course- the billionaire that Amelia had supposedly _not _gone on a date with, and a strange little girl in Amelia's arms ready to greet her. Amelia handed off the little girl and welcomed Regina to Gotham with open arms. She held Amelia away at arms length and scrutinized her as if to see if she were any different from last time she saw her. The only difference that she could see, since she last saw her almost three months ago, was her hair was a little longer.

"Please don't tell me you've gotten married and adopted a kid already?" She asked.

"Oh, gosh no! Me and Bruce are just together and the little girl, Sophie, we found her at the library and she was abandoned. That was actually what I need your help with. But, let's go home first." She suggested leading her over to where Bruce was. He handed Sophie back to Amelia long enough to greet Regina and tell them he had business to attend to, which Amelia knew what business he had to see to, considering she wouldn't be getting any 'work' done tonight.

"Can I call you aunt Gina?" Sophie asked Regina tiredly in the car. Regina just smiled brightly and nodded.

Back in Amelia's home, she had just placed Sophie in the small bed Bruce had sent to Amelia's house, and she returned to Regina setting up her bed on Amelia's pull-out couch.

"So, what happened in California?" Amelia sat down in the armchair across form the couch and pulled her feet up to rest her head on her knees.

"After I dumped Greg, he moved out of the apartment, then I lost my job so I couldn't keep up on rent and got evicted. Everything I own is in storage and I don't even know if I'll be able to pay for it to keep it there." Regina admitted, sitting on the couch Indian-style.

"Well, you know I have room here. I live in a safe neighborhood, you could keep all your stuff in the unfinished part of the basement until you get settled, and you could even get a job at Wayne Enterprises, I'm sure I could get Bruce to get you a job there; I know we wouldn't get any work done if you worked at Bennet though." Amelia gave a knowing and somewhat encouraging smile to her lifelong friend.

"I mean, I wouldn't want to intrude. I know I'd be burden."

"Nonsense! You'd be welcomed here with open arms. Maybe we could even get you a nice boyfriend?" She said with a smile

"I guess I could live here for a little while, if you're absolutely sure."

"Actually, there is one condition." Regina nodded, signaling for her to continue. "I'd need someone to take care of Sophie, and I know how much you want a child. I knew it'd be a huge chance that we'd never find her brother that she lost in a city like this, we've already filed a report with the police, so I was just planning on adopting her. But, with me being Empress, I'd need someone to look over her at night."

"Are you serious? I'd love that!" Amelia saw the familiar sparkle in Regina's eyes, one that she hadn't seen since they talked about growing up and having kids in high school. "You could even go out tonight, if you wanted to."

"Oh no, I'm sure Batman has it covered. Anyway, he can send me a distress call if he really needs my help."

"Ah, so you're paired with Batman, huh?" Amelia nodded. For the next hour or so, Amelia talked about her plans to open homeless shelters with Wayne enterprises collaboratively, and she also told her about Tyler and how he was a new uprising criminal. "If Gotham's not notorious for theatrical criminals, they sure are notorious for dirty cops."

"Oh no." Amelia stood up from her place on the couch when she heard beeping from her basement, alerting her that someone was in the property. "Go check on Sophie, stay up there, lock the door. There's someone in the yard." Amelia had specifically placed Sophie in the room with the lock -that was supposed to be an office- in case something like his happened so she would have means of protecting her. She may not be Amelia's daughter, but she was responsible for her until they found her brother.

She made her way out to the yard and stealthily made her way over to the carriage house where she saw the doors were open. When she walked in, she saw a black heap of what was supposed to be the Batman laying over the door to her passage to the lair. She dropped the Louisville slugger she picked up on her way out and closed the doors before turning on a light and rushing over to the still form.

"Bruce, holy crap what happened to you?" She exclaimed as she rolled the huge body over to get a good look at him. The only thing she could see was wrong was that he wasn't moving -but still breathing.

"I found...Sophie's brother, dead, formerly...working for Firefly. They...caught me peeking in and...injected me with the burn toxin. It hurts...less when I...don't move." Bruce managed to mutter out in between gasps.

"She's going to be heart broken. But I can't tell her the truth." Amelia concluded, as Bruce tried to nod in agreement. "Do we have an antidote?"

"No...but I'm sure...Lucius could...make something." He grunted out.

"I'm going to need you to walk with me. I'm putting you in my bed and knocking you out with a sedative until I can get Lucius over here." She said with an air of finality, signaling for Bruce to just agree and go with it, which he did. As they slowly made their way into Amelia's house, she saw Regina poking her head out the door and Amelia told her to stay in there and she'd explain things later.

After she laid him down onto her bed, she ran down and injected a sedative to knock him out and called Lucius to get an antidote for future use. The toxin would have worn off by the time they developed something but she wanted Bruce to be examined, and she wanted to be prepared for next time. -Although, she hoped it wouldn't happen again, she knew it was inevitable.

"Bruce?" Amelia had asked worriedly when she heard him grunt, making her way out of the armchair she had been dozing off in for the past few hours. "Don't move. Don't get up." She told him, as she noticed he was trying to get out of the bed.

"The toxin wore off but, you're still going to be sore." A familiar voice to Bruce mentioned, coming out of the shadows. "I left the antidote with Amelia here." Bruce nodded and Lucius promptly left.

"I've decided what I want to do for the new security in the lair." Amelia mentioned, trying to make some small talk. She pulled out a piece of paper that looked like a diagram of the basement to Bruce and he looked at her and waited for her to continue. "I was thinking, instead of getting rid of the rigged bookcase, since it's amazing, we extend a closed off room into the lair and require my hand print and eye scan to get in there. Then for the outer entrance, since there's the tunnel, at the bottom of the stairs, require an eye scan of one of us; in case you need to come by here again. That is, if your guy is able to do that sort of thing."

"He'll be able to, I'm sure." Bruce assured her. "Uh, when did my clothes change?" He noticed he was now in a white button down and a dark wash pair of jeans.

"Alfred brought over some spare clothes for me to keep here, in case this ever happens again, and I decided to change you in case Sophie escaped Regina's sight and decided to come in here. You started yelling at one point and I had to tell Sophie you were here and you were having a bad dream." Amelia said cautiously, the last thing she wanted was for him to be mad at her.

"I don't really remember much about last night after I stumbled into your yard. Did I tell you about Sophie's brother?"

"Yes. I don't know how I'm going to tell her that her brother isn't coming back for her. And we're going to have to be extremely careful around Firefly considering what's been happening lately." Bruce nodded and sat up in the bed just in time to hear little feet running down the hall and Regina yelling something like:

"Sophie, get back here 'Bruce-y' is resting!" Amelia opened the door when she heard the struggle of a little hand to open it and told Regina that it was okay, and that they were both up.

"Bruce-y!" Was all Bruce heard before he felt boney knees landing on his chest and having the wind knocked out of him. "Mia said you were having bad dreams and I was sad."

"Don't be sad, Sophie. I'm okay." He patted the small child on the head as consolation. Truth was, he didn't have any experience with kids whatsoever, but he enjoyed seeing Amelia run around after Sophie and play.

"I have to take her to Commissioner Gordon to tell him about her brother, then we're going to the toy store. Join us?" Amelia asked.

"Uh, sure." He said, moving Sophie off of his chest and onto the foot of the bed before dropping over to do a few push-ups, then stretched out his stiff body.

"Alfred dropped your car off. Regina's going to stay here to call and get her stuff shipped over here and we're ready to go if you are." She announced, holding out her hand for Sophie to climb off the bed. "Go tell Aunt Gina bye and we're going to go see a new friend."

"Aunt Gina! I'm gonna meet a new friend! Bye!" Sophie yelled excitedly, running toward Regina, hugging her, and running back to Amelia to take her hand.

"Sophie, I have to tell you something. Your big brother went to a safe place yesterday. That's why we're going to meet our new friend." Amelia confessed in the car on the way to Major Crimes.

"With mommy?" She asked sadly, and sniffled.

"Yes, with mommy. You'll get to see them again someday, don't be sad. You're gonna get to live with me and Aunt Gina and get to see Bruce-y a lot. How about that?" She tried to console as best she could as she was driving, turning to look at her at a red light.

"I can stay with you until I can see mommy and Thomas?" She wondered, cheering up quite a bit. Amelia nodded and kept driving.

"You're sure he's...dead?" Gordon whispered the word 'dead' when he saw Sophie playing with Bruce as he spoke with Amelia.

"Yes. Batman came by to confirm last night. I'd like to adopt Sophie, I'm not going to send her to an orphanage when I could very well take care of her."

"Well when you came by yesterday we checked out your file and you're more than qualified to adopt her. I'll fax over your file and Sophie's file to children's services and escort you over to get paperwork." He suggested, leading Amelia out of his office.

~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~

It was a grueling three hours of haggling with adoption services and another two hours of trying to find clothes, toys, and furniture for Sophie's bedroom; trying to get it all delivered to Amelia's house was a different struggle entirely which took flirting from Amelia with the middle aged man to get him to do it, before they finally left to go home and make Sophie some dinner.

Bruce was following Amelia home behind her Porsche in his new Lamborghini. The light had just turned green and they started moving forward when Bruce noticed a truck didn't stop at the light perpendicular from them and was about to hit Amelia's car when Bruce pulled around and blocked most of the collision with his own car, but the truck hit the back end of his car, sending it spinning to the midpoint of Amelia's car, crushing the entire right side; the side Sophie was sitting on.

The truck drove off as soon as it happened, and Bruce practically flew out of the car, going to check on Amelia and Sophie all while calling the police. When he got done explaining the situation to the police he opened the car to help Amelia out who, didn't have any more than a few cuts from broken glass, was simply in shock about the event that just took place. Bruce pulled her into his arms and she wrapped her small arms around his waist and burst into tears.

"Wait, Sophie, what happened to Sophie?" She asked worriedly, the panic really set in when Bruce didn't answer. "Sophie! Please no, Sophie!" She screamed, opening the passenger door on her side of the car to get to the unconscious child.

Amelia had Sophie cradled against her when the police finally arrived after the longest ten minutes of Amelia's entire life. She was hyperventilating from crying and Bruce was trying to calm her down when the medics took Sophie to an ambulance. They had decided to take Sophie to the hospital to examine her fully, and Amelia and Bruce climbed into the back of the ambulance.

"Mia..." A small voice broke through the sirens and it sounded like music to Amelia's ears. She burst into tears again and took Sophie's hand.

"It's okay. You'll be okay." Amelia choked out, still holding the girl's hand.

**A/N: So, this is pretty much the only original story line I've come up with that actually turned out for this entire story. XDD**

**I can't even begin to explain how much effort and work I've put into the next four or five chapters. lol**

**Basically I sat at home and wrote 3 chapters for three hours last night and my brain is still recovering. lmao So please, don't hesitate to tell me what you thought!**

**This is the longest chapter in the story so far with originally 2,359 words! (Not including the A/N:) I'm so excited about that! XD**

**Good? Bad? Lemme know!  
**


	12. Chapter 12

**Chapter 12**

Sophie cried when the doctors told her she couldn't go see Bruce after her examination. She had broken her arm and had major cuts down the right side of her body. All Amelia could do was hold her hand and tell her she'd be okay, and yet she was livid that she couldn't do more to comfort the small child. She couldn't help but feel responsible, what if she had put her on the other side of the car? What if she had a safer vehicle? What if's made their way through her mind as she watched Bruce being questioned by the police, happy that her questioning was over with.

The police had caught the man who had committed the hit and run, and took him down to the station. A second group of officers questioned Bruce on what happened, since he was the one to stop the would-have-been fatal car crash.

"All I know is, his light was red, ours was green, and he kept driving. I just got in between him and Amelia to stop it. I don't know if he was out for blood but he didn't get it." Bruce said rubbing his neck, the doctors had examined it and said it would be sore for a few days, possibly even a week. Amelia had the same symptoms, and they both had cuts to show what they had been through.

~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~

"Sir, the man you sent out to take out your girl failed. Pretty boy got in the way, and told the police." A henchman told his boss apprehensively. Over the phone, he heard the man slam something down and exhale sharply.

"See Leonard, this is why you can't send someone to do your job for you. You gotta do it all by yourself." A normally cocky voice said sounding annoyed.

"Yes sir." The man said before hearing the familiar click of the phone being put on its cradle.

~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~

"Regina, we're fine. Thankfully to Bruce. Sophie has to stay over to make sure nothing else happened, but me and Bruce checked out. No, I'm not going out tonight. I want to look like responsible parent when my new daughter is in the hospital, Batman will be able to handle things for now." Amelia explained in the privacy of Alfred's Roll's Royce that he picked them up in. "We're pulling into the driveway now, see you there."

"Thanks Alfred, you can head home. My suit is still here so, I'll just stay here until I need it." Bruce told the butler. Alfred nodded once and drove away once the doors were firmly closed.

"Are you sure you're going to be able to handle everything? I can't help but feel that was not just a coincidence." Amelia mentioned, joining Bruce up her driveway onto the walk.

"I'll be fine." Bruce said wrapping an arm around her shoulders and kissing her forehead. "The press are going to have a field day with this one though. We probably won't be able to infiltrate Tyler's house."

"I don't care. My loved one's safety is more important than my publicity." Amelia said, opening the door to a red-eyed best friend.

"Thank God!" Regina lunged at Amelia wrapping her arms around her neck. "You have _got _to start telling me these things sooner."

"I'm sorry, we were with Soph- What's that?" Amelia asked looking straight at the TV where is showed a building in downtown Gotham burning.

'...Where it seems our newest threat to the city has burnt down city hall. Now before we jump to any conclusions to who this criminal is, according to medics who examined a few people already saved from the rubble, they were dead before the building even caught fire with some unknown substance in every one of the victim's bodies so far. Another interesting factor, the way the building is burning it is said to be shaped in an 'E' shape; according to our news copter. Could this be a coincidence? Or is this new guy aiming for our vigilantress Empress? In other news unemployment has...'

The whole room was silent as they just stared blankly at the television, no one knew what to say to acknowledge the new discovery.

"Uh, I'll go get us something to drink..." Regina suggested stumbling away to the kitchen.

"Bruce, you need to go out there. I can't leave because of Sophie but she'll be released in the morning and I'll be able to go out tomorrow night."

"I don't know what you want me to do about it we can't do anything. Every time I try to go out there, I get burned -no pun intended." Bruce answered. Honestly, for the first time in a long time, he didn't know what to do. Part of his judgment was clouded _because _of Amelia and he couldn't think clearly. He was in too deep with her and he knew it; but he also knew he was in too deep to stop it. There was no way of stopping this man without killing him because he'll always have the advantage. It was like the Joker all over again except, he caught the Joker but, he didn't know if he could deliver this time around.

"Gee I don't know, Maybe find out why the hell this man is targeting me!" She said as loudly as she could without alerting Regina to the commotion.

"I'll do the best I can but, I can't help but feel responsible all of this is happening." He turned away to head to the basement to get his suit on. When he was almost to the door, he felt a small, warm hand on his arm and he closed his eyes to savor the feeling and turned around.

"None of this is your fault, nor will it ever be, just be safe please. I'll be back tomorrow, I promise." She said to him, reaching onto her tip-toes to kiss him on the nose. He opened his eyes to wrap an arm around her waist to give her one last kiss before promising to be safe and departing for the basement.

"Where's Bruce?" Regina asked a few minutes later to find Amelia sitting on the couch.

"He was called away. Let's watch a movie?" Amelia suggested to steer Regina away from asking any questions.

It was after their second movie when Regina finally headed up to bed to leave Amelia to wait for Bruce's call that he returned home safely.

~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~

It took Bruce a few hours to realize that Firefly had regrouped and moved locations. It took him almost all night of searching to remember that Tyler had a tracking device on him and he could easily find them again.

When he had finally found them again, they were in a quarantined area that the police had not been able to salvage from the damage of the Joker. He looked into the building to see that their leader was missing and by some gut feeling all Batman could think was that he was headed for Amelia.

~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~

"Let me go you cowardly bast-" Amelia was silenced with a gag as someone made quick work with tying her to something that she guess was a post. She had to admit she was little frightened, her whole world was blocked out when she finished putting things into the dryer, someone had blind folded her and bound her arms, throwing her into a car for about ten minutes before she was dragged out and now being tied to something.

"Now, are you going to be a good little girl and be quiet?" A now all-too familiar voice asked of Amelia. Amelia grudgingly nodded.

"Whatever you want, I'll give it to you. Just let me go! Please, my daughter is in the hospital and my friends don't know where I am." She wasn't one for begging but, she needed to be home. She had tried to put up a fight when they got into her house but it was safe to say her guard had been a little damaged today.

"You gave your daughter up for adoption thirteen years ago, there's no way you could have remembered." A voice Amelia only recognized as Ryan's answered.

"Ryan? Wait. What are you talking about?" She asked, sounding despaired. _What is he talking about? I've never had a kid. Thirteen years ago I was in high school. I would have never. _"Ryan?" She asked after a few moments silence. The only things she could think of was that they had either left or were planning on what to do with her and she could only pray that Bruce figured out that she was gone.

~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~

Bruce was almost to Amelia's house before he saw the smoke coming from her general direction and he sped up to get there just in time to see a fire started in her living room.

He walked into the soon-to-be in flames room, and went straight into the kitchen to get a pitcher of water; the fire had not gotten big enough to do so much damage quite yet.

He had just extinguished the last of it before he felt someone trying to grab him from behind. Batman simply turned around and released a batarang, lodging itself in the man's arm. Then, he took him down, Batman's large frame pinning the goon's to the ground.

"Where did you take Amelia?" He snarled at the shaking man. The goon remained silent in fear. "Where are they?" He practically screamed in the man's face.

"They're at the docks, warehouse district, number 53. Don't hurt me!" He whimpered, cringing at the last part; expecting Batman to strike him.

"Batman?" Regina's voice called out. "Batman, the police are on the way. I called to let them know that there was someone in the house. You better get out of here."

"Get yourself in a room with a lock and stay there. Better yet, go into the basement into the room with a bookcase and read I Am Legend." Regina quirked her eyebrow at the request, then remembered when she viewed the house, she had distracted the Realtor enough to snoop around the basement to see a first edition of I Am Legend, a favorite of hers' and Amelia's since before high school, when she pulled it out and discovered the extra room.

Batman followed her down to Empress' lair and grabbed her suit before turning to leave

"Okay. Thank you, you know, for your help." Batman just nodded and left without another word, rushing over to the -typical- place criminals would take their victims. Only he hoped that Amelia had remained untouched.

~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~

"Ryan you let me go or so help me I will-"

"You'll what? Spit on me? Drown me in your tears?" He said the last part in a mock upset voice.

"You know what you are? You're just a coward. You couldn't come after me yourself, initially and tonight. You always had to send someone else to do it. You're afraid of me. You'd never admit it, obviously. You're just a little bi-" Amelia was cut off my a sharp cracking and then a blistering pain on her face she only recognized as a backhanded slap she'd received only once before from Ryan. She still couldn't see anything, but she could just imagine the livid expression plastered onto Ryan's face.

"You know what? I'm going to have a lot of fun with you tonight, _wifey._" Ryan said in an intimidating voice, and the pull of leather Amelia guessed to be a whip or a belt.

"Does your _wife_ know you came to see me, or should I keep this our little secret?" She said in a way of saying that she wasn't afraid of anything he could do. She felt hands slide themselves behind her head and the blindfold fell to the floor, revealing a dirty, rusty, and damp warehouse. From the sounds outside she guessed they were at the docks. She looked up to find Ryan glaring straight at her, and 'Firefly' A.K.A. Tyler standing in a similar stance -legs apart, arms across his chest; trying to look scary- and more than likely glaring at her as well, and finally to the goons who looked like they were stifling laughs from Amelia's backhanded comments. "Eff." She sighed, knowing that it was going to be a long night.

**A/N: I know the whole 'I Am Legend' thing is really cheesy but, it's my favorite book so I had incorporate it somehow. XD**

**I'm excited about the next few chapters but it also might mean that the story is coming to an end, (or maybe not) and I don't want that to happen yet! D:**

**Anyway, I hope you enjoyed it!**

**Good? Bad? Lemme know!  
**


	13. Chapter 13

**Chapter 13**

Batman parked the equivalent of two blocks away from warehouse 53, as means to not alert anyone of his presence.

Walking up the confusing twists and turns of the random layout of the warehouse district, Bruce found a few goons splayed out along the perimeter. Knocking out most of them easily, he came across one that was particularly difficult. She was obviously a girl, the tight suit did nothing to hide the upper part of her physique and she swung her hips toward him suggestively, begging him to let his guard down to inject him with the toxin.

She had almost made her way over to him in that painfully long saunter over to him, and he took his stance. She stopped for a split second, realizing that she wasn't going to get her chance at seducing her way into injecting him so she did the next best thing; lunged for him. He was careful to avoid hitting her _too _hard, knowing that certain girls were much more liable to injury, and the fact that her shortness and petite body led him to believe that she was not very old, and he wasn't going to get child abuse put onto his record. He dodged her attempt at kicking him in the face, and tried to catch her foot only to have her spin out of his grip all-too gracefully. She landed a roundhouse -attempting at hitting him in the face?- but with her height, it landed around the top of his ribcage -which he felt a little through the armor, but not enough to disable him.

"You're here to save that girl, when the rest of the city is at stake of burning? Pathetic what some men will do for _love._" Her sultry voice mocked him. And she laughed at him sardonically.

"I don't have friends, I don't have lovers. I'm here to help." He said, landing a punch to her stomach while she was busy rolling her eyes at his remark, she double over to the ground, and he made quick work to tie her up to a fire escape before contacting Jim Gordon. "I have word from a goon of Firefly's that something other than City Hall is going to burn tonight. Send teams out to major facilities and clear them." He said abruptly, not waiting for a response when he heard heavy footsteps coming his way.

~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~

Amelia screamed as she felt the effects of the toxin set in, adding to the pain of the previous leather marks, the ones being made at that very moment, _and _her previous cuts from the car accident. She felt for Bruce, for having to go through this -minus the whipping. Then she remembered that Bruce said it felt better if you didn't move so she tried to keep herself from moving, but the pain was becoming unbearable and she felt herself giving out. One way she knew she was about to pass out, every time she had passed out since she was about eleven, she would start shivering so bad it looked as if she were convulsing, and everything goes black. She could feel the shiver setting in, and mixing with the fear toxin, the hot and cold mix was not the most pleasant.

She ripped her previously closed eyes open as she felt a new sensation of electricity flowing throughout her body, not in an enjoyable way, and she let loose a scream that could make a grown man cry, before she passed out, everything going black, and her body feeling nothing.

~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~

Batman looked up as her heard a scream towards the center of the path he was taking. After knocking out two other guys and bounding them to the fire escape with the girl, Batman heaved himself from his kneeling position and started to make his way over to the warehouse before was interrupted by his earphone ringing; it was either Alfred, Lucius, or Gordon, and he doubted it was the first two unless it was extremely important.

"Batman, we've already checked the courthouse, mayor's office, Arkham, and Balckgate, there are no explosives or any flammable objects or detonators in any of the buildings. We've stationed a team at each but-"

"Are they inside?"

"Who?"

"The officers, are they inside the buildings?"

"Yes."

"Get everybody out anyway. Get to the hospitals, clear them out too. Get every person in this city out of public facilities." Batman's voice reaching a new level of urgency with every word he spoke. He hung up the phone as soon as he heard a blood-curdling scream that hurt his ears; even at the distance he was away from the building. He took out two more goons without barely as much as a blink before kicking the door open and stomping inside -also while pressing a button for his Tumbler to come wait outside of the building.

It was an understatement to say that Batman was pissed. They could do anything to him, he couldn't care less, but when they messed with his alter egos' loved ones -since Batman claimed to have no friends, that was crossing a line and whether Amelia did something to deserve all this or not, he was not going to let her suffer.

Then, a thought crossed Batman's mind enough to make him completely stop in his trek upstairs. What if Amelia wanted to leave Gotham after this? He had heard how she went to a new city, helped rid it of a few criminals, while holding up her great company, and eventually moved. He had heard her excited plans to take the company international, and was worried she'd leave the country, never to return. Was she just going to decide that this lifestyle in Gotham wasn't for her and pack her and Sophie up and leave? Or would she stay a little longer and wait to see how their relationship went? Batman couldn't dwell on the thought much longer before he heard loud whimpers and moans of pain echoing throughout the empty building.

~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~

Amelia came to not five minutes later to find her face wet; figuring they had dumped water on her to wake her up. When she looked around, she saw the room was empty, and she was no longer tied to the central beam, but still bound at the wrists, thighs, and ankles. She accidentally focused on the pain of the ropes rubbing into her skin -in her training they taught her to focus on other things, the pain would be less intense if the mind was distracted. Every time she took a breath, she felt the burns of the leather marks and where she had been electrocuted increase. She let out loud whimpers and a couple moans of pain as she tried to lift herself to a sitting or even kneeling position.

"Did you have a good nap?" She heard Ryan's voice ask as he entered the room

"Yes, are you having a good time? Better enjoy it while you can because as you know, karma's a bi-" She was silenced once again as the back of Ryan's hand met with her face again.

"You should probably learn to hold your tongue dear one, it may be beneficial in the end." He patted her on the head as if she were a dog. She was tempted to bite it.

"If I held it, I'd bite it, and that hurts." She retorted weakly.

~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~

Batman heard the definite snap of a hand meeting skin and started making his way, very quickly, through the building again. He made it up to the third floor, where he could hear faint voices, to come face to face with a group of Firefly's -or Ryan's, Batman couldn't tell- minions.

He took out the first few easily, leaving about five behind. While he was distracted by a rather heavy guy, the other four were busy lighting up more flame balls to throw at him. They were standing close enough together that he could release the blades on his forearm, and decided to do just that. Pressing the release and swinging his arm a little so each of the six would land somewhere on all of their faces,they were distracted enough for Batman to grab the fireballs and throw them right back at them. As all of them fell unconscious one after one, Bruce started making his way toward the voices again.

He heard Ryan say something about Amelia holding her tongue and couldn't help but smile slightly at Amelia's remark about not being able to because she would bite her tongue and it would hurt.

~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~

Amelia had hit a wall. Ryan injected another dosing of the toxin and waited for it to set in before electrocuting her more. Her body could sustain more since the first time but she could still feel her eyes trying to drift closed into nothingness. Ryan would space it out so that every time she thought he would let up and she could drift into blackness again, he electrocuted her again; almost feeling like the voltage was higher and higher each time.

When she was just about to drift off again, the door came crashing open and in came a black mass and took Ryan down in what seemed like a split second. Ryan still held the shockers that were being used on Amelia and put them on Batman before it went off again. Amelia could only imagine that through his armor it only felt like one of those toy pranks where you got a buzz every time you touch a certain place on a cell phone or a lighter, and was overjoyed when Batman threw Ryan to the ground, succeeding in knocking him out.

~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~

The last couple feet up the room where Amelia was currently being held was like hell, he could hear a buzzing sound like a resuscitator going off and could only think that it was Amelia feeling the pain of it.

When he entered the room, a rage filled him that he hadn't felt since he'd decided to become a vigilante to help stop criminals like this and he lost control. He practically flew into the room and landed on top of Ryan. Ryan tried to use the shockers on him but it merely felt like a vibration and Batman almost scoffed at the effort this man was putting out to take him down. After a few seconds of worthless shocking, Batman threw Ryan to the ground and watched as Ryan's eyes closed and his breathing lagged.

Batman looked to Amelia urgently, the anger subsiding until he saw what kind of a state she was in. Her hair was a tangled mess, her face was red and swollen from only God knew how many slaps, and the way that her t-shirt had ridden up, he saw circles where the little shockers had been placed on her body. She looked pained, and he could take a wild guess that they injected her with the toxin to worsen the pain.

"Don't move." He said, taking the sharp end of a batarang to sever the ropes around her wrists first, then her ankles and simply slid the third rope from her thighs. She crashed into him, wrapping her arms around his neck to cry for a couple of minutes.

"Where's my...suit." She sniffled out, her voice sounding weak.

"I can't let you fight. Not like this."

"Batman, this has to end. And I'm going to help."

"It's in the Tumbler, which is right outside." He sighed in defeat. She got up shakily and stumbled over to the door, trying to gether her wits before the battle ensued.

"This ends tonight." She declared with finality before heading the to Tumbler to change.

"I know it will. I can only hope that people will make it out okay." Batman whispered to himself before exiting the room as well to the other room of goons just waiting to be taken out.

**A/N: So, here it is, yet another chapter! I'm sorry these ones that are supposed to be filled with action aren't very good, I'm just not good at the whole action thing and I may have ruined some parts by my terminology, but I couldn't think of any other words. XD**

**Anyway, I hope you enjoyed and I hope there aren't too many mistakes because I didn't get to proof read this one yet.**

**Good? Bad? Lemme know!  
**


	14. Chapter 14

**Chapter 14**

When Empress reentered the room that she was being held in, she saw Firefly and Ryan having some sort of battle, and she found Batman crumpled in a corner looking more vulnerable than usual. _It's a good thing Bruce was smart enough to bring the antidote. _She thought to herself before sneaking her way over to her vigilante boyfriend.

"Batman, look at me, what happened?" Bruce shook his head 'no' as if to say 'I'm not telling until you give me that antidote.' Empress sighed angrily at his stubbornness, and injected the antidote in a place where there was a gap in his armor.

~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~

It had been a strange turn of events, in the time between beating up more goons and getting back to the torture room. In that time, Firefly had caught up to Ryan and was in the process of chewing him out for not getting to do anything.

"You said she'd be here." Firefly yelled out

"I said she might. And I don't want to hear about how you can't do anything, I gave you plenty to do, like killing Amelia, and you couldn't even do that. We'll see if you get a shot at your beloved Empress."

"The guy that I sent to kill her for you couldn't do it, don't pin this on me."

"You hired him!" And that's when Ryan looked away for a second and saw Batman over in the corner, just kind of watching. And all of it was a blur up until he felt himself being stabbed with a needle, and then Empress showing up with the antidote.

After Empress had injected him, he felt almost immediate relief, and his ear phone started ringing again.

"Batman, I guess you could say you were kind of right. The city did burn. But not in the way that you'd think. Somehow that toxin you were telling us about was airborne and in a high enough dosage to make people go almost insane at the burning sensation through their bodies. A man named Lucius sent over an antidote and told me where to find the source of the toxin and told me to switch it and...Almost everyone survived." He said with grief in his voice at that last part. "Certain people refused to leave the buildings and a few officers who were evacuating had a low enough tolerance for pains and burns that they just freaked out and some ran into walls, some were shot by each other and themselves..." Batman sighed into his earpiece and let his head drop back against the wall. _More blood on my hands. _He thought to himself looking down at his gloved fingers. Empress saw this and placed her hands in his, almost reading his face.

"There's nothing that could have been done." She said before getting up and walking over to the still-bickering pair.

"Gentlemen, please, no need to fight over lil' 'ole me." She placed her hands on both of their chests and backed them away from each other, keeping her eyes on Firefly because she knew Ryan knew it was her. He had always known, but she had a few things against him that kept his lips sealed tight. She barely took her eyes off of Firefly for a second, to signal Batman for assistance, when he lunged at her, taking her to the ground. When she recovered, Firefly was preparing...something that burned. Empress just wasn't sure yet. As he lit it on fire, he was still straddling her at the waist and he mounted the pebble looking object into a slingshot. at the last second, Empress was able to free one of her hands and push Firefly's arm upwards, so that the burning pebble hit Ryan, setting his shirt on fire. As Ryan dropped to the floor to stop the fire from spreading, Empress pushed Firefly off her and landed a kick to his throat making him drop to the floor. Empress saw out of the corner of her eye Ryan approaching her with the shockers again and she roundhouse kicked him in the face where he dropped next to Firefly. Snatching the little metal things out of Ryan's hands, Amelia crouched and placed one on both mens' chests and hit the button for them to engage. As she sent a few shocks through each of them, she managed to snarl out through her anger;

"And eye for an eye, right?"

"Oh my, didn't you hear? An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind?" Ryan gasped out as the pain of the shock set in.

"Nah, it only makes you half blind." She retorted.

"Empress let's go, the police are here." Batman called out urgently. She flicked both of them on the forehead condescendingly and then turned to leave with Batman.

As they were about to go into the Tumbler, both Empress and Batman -and the police officers- heard yelling from about where Empress and Batman had just been and then saw both men flying out of the window, towards the ground -head first.

"No!" Empress screamed and tried running toward the scene where both men had landed but a strong arm around her waist held her back.

"You can't let them know who you are."

"But, Ryan- He. He was my first husband. And even though he was terrible to me, I still loved him somewhere inside of me." She sobbed into Batman's armor as he stroked her hair soothingly.

"I know, but you can't let them know. We should get you out of here." Batman led her back to the Tumbler and told her to wait there as he saw Gordon approaching.

"That was a man named Ryan and my officer Tyler. Better known as Firefly." Gordan said gravely, half at the deaths of the young men, and half at the corruption of yet another cop.

"I know." Was all Batman said.

"That makes thirteen dead for this attack on the city. Please tell me Amelia was okay." Gorgon said, _Maybe something could go right this time._

"She's fine, I took her home and she's sleeping. No major injuries." He grumbled out, trying not to think of how Ryan's fate might have changed if she had been majorly hurt.

"Bring her in tomorrow for questioning?"

"I'll tell her." He said then disappeared into the Tumbler to take Amelia home for real so she could get some sleep before she had to go get Sophie from the hospital at eight; approximately five hours.

"Yes I'm fine Mrs. Grey. I'm really sorry about what happened to him too. Alright, take care, bye." Amelia was still upset about what happened to her ex-husband and friend. "That was Ryan's mom. My cell phone had been in my pocket the entire time." She laughed grimly. Ryan's mom had always liked Amelia and was extremely upset when she had found out Ryan cheated on her. They had tried to keep in touch and this was the first time she had talked to Evelyn Grey since moving to Gotham. "The funeral will be as soon as they get the body so, I'll be going to California sometime soon." Bruce nodded but stayed silent the whole ten minute ride to Amelia's house. "The hospital called. They got Sophie out in time and I still have to pick her up tomorrow morning but, I don't have a car." She mentioned somewhat embarrassed.

"I'll pick you up." Bruce promised. He had driven through the front gates and back behind the carriage house, where he could hide the Tumbler for now.

"Ryan said something about me giving a daughter up for adoption thirteen years ago. This is probably a stupid question but, do you know anything about that?" Amelia asked looking down at her fingers in her lap. She saw Bruce's bare hand reach over to hers and held it, his thumb stroking the back of it.

"That day that Ryan came to get the divorce papers he asked me if we were sleeping together and he told me about how you guys went out in high school." Bruce looked over at Amelia's face. Her brows were knitted in the middle as if trying to remember. "He said that you guys used to go at it a lot, and he said you get pregnant. He convinced you that you'd be a terrible mom, and manipulated you into giving it up for adoption. He said that you got really depressed after and started taking all kinds of sleeping pills. You eventually went into a coma and had amnesia, forgetting what had happened in the past year. It was like your brain shut down and deleted the part that it experienced during that year." Bruce finally admitted. Amelia finally lifted her head, and he saw new tear stains on her cheek and instantly felt terrible for not mentioning it sooner.

"Why didn't you tell me sooner?" She whispered, for fear Bruce might think she was mad he didn't.

"I didn't know when the right time was." He told her, kissing her hand. She smiled a little and cupped his, now cowl-less, cheek and he leaned into it. She leaned over to kiss him at the same time he leaned in to kiss her and they ended up hitting their foreheads together and Amelia laughed, for the first time in what felt like an eternity.

"Well, if that isn't a mood killer, I don't know what is." She joked before hitting the button to open the door on the Tumbler to get out. "Goodnight, _Batman. _I'll see you tomorrow." She kissed his nose before jumping out and into the carriage house where she descended into her lair to find Regina asleep on her office chair in front of the computer. "Regina?" She asked shaking her shoulder. Regina jumped up and rubbed her eyes before pulling Amelia into her second bear hug of the night from her best friend.

"I just fell back to sleep. I've been waking up every hour to watch the news. Here, look." Regina said, turning Amelia towards the t.v. that was set on GCN.

"Hi, Casey Floyd here with Gotham City News, where we're reporting the recent attack on our city. It seems our, now deceased, criminal Firefly had set a toxin that made people think they were burning airborne in most public facilities, resulting in eleven deaths from the toxin, thirteen total. If it had not been for Batman and Empress, the death rate of tonight would have been higher. Also, it seems Gotham's newest princess had been captured by her, also deceased, ex-husband slash criminal and Firefly, who we now learned had been Gotham's own Tyler Franklin, and tortured with the same toxin. Commissioner Gordon has informed us that she is resting safe and sound at home, and we hope that every one else is too. Again, I'm Casey Floyd, and you're watching GCN. Stay tuned for a possible new cure to rabies..."

Amelia just stared at the t.v., wondering how news stations got their information so fast.

"I need sleep." She moaned, sounding more like a zombie than anything. "I have to go get Sophie at eight. Bruce is coming to get me, then I have to go to the police station and talk to Gordon or whatever. See you tomorrow." Regina nodded and agreed that she'd be up soon too.

As Amelia crawled into bed that night -or rather morning- she felt a peace she hadn't felt in a while. The only things that were missing were her boyfriend, and her surrogate daughter.

She had finally fallen asleep with a smile on her face that she hadn't worn since the night Bruce had slept in that same bed.

**A/N: I can't help but feel the little confrontation with Ryan/Empress/Firefly was a lil cheesy but I'm just too dang lazy to rewrite it so, there ya go. lol**

**I guess this story is not coming to an end anytime soon, which is good for me and I'm hoping good for you guys too!**

**Good? Bad? Lemme know!  
**


	15. Chapter 15

**Chapter 15**

When Bruce had picked her up that morning, he picked her up in a car that looked exactly like her old one. A Porsche Panamera with the soft lilac coloring she always liked.

"What is this?" She asked cheerfully as she climbed into the car. Bruce leaned over and tucked a piece of hair behind her ear before kissing her, succeeding in making her blush.

"Your new car." He looked and laughed at her surprised, and speechless, _Not to mention beautiful, _face as she squealed with delight.

"Get out, get out, get out, I'm driving." She said practically pushing him out of the driver's seat to take her place back in the seat of command.

When they arrived at the hospital, you would have never guessed that it had been under attack the night before. Other than the bus loads of people who were still being moved back into their rooms. Amelia had checked in with the head nurse and gave her a set of extra clothes to change Sophie into at the front desk, where they had to wait for about ten minutes before they heard a little giggle.

"Mia! Bruce-y!" She practically screamed and launched herself into Amelia's waiting arms -Amelia was careful to watch for her broken arm, and noticed that her cuts didn't have the furious red color it had when she was admitted last night. She kissed the little girl on the forehead, and handed her off to Bruce where Sophie grabbed Bruce's face -as best she could with her bad arm- to look at him. "I missed ya, kid!" Which made Bruce crack a smile and Amelia laughed along with the nurses.

"She's a doll, she learned that phrase from her next door neighbor, Mr. Hendricks, who had his little girl visit him. You two really are lucky." The nurse mentioned. Amelia blushed a tomato red and Bruce mentioned that this wasn't their little girl, and muttered that she must not watch too much t.v. or read many magazines to figure it out; which earned a stab in the ribs by Amelia's elbow before she signed Sophie out, smiled sweetly and they ushered the little girl out of the hospital.

"Sophie, honey, we're going to see our friend at the police station again, okay?" Amelia mentioned while strapping Sophie into the booster seat -not car seat- she was required to sit in.

"Goodie! Anna-banana always plays with me!" Sophie giggled, referring to Anna Ramirez. Anna had changed since the Joker's attack. She became even more hard working a trusting, reminding herself not to be manipulated by common criminals. She was still bitter towards Batman; as were most.

Arriving at MCU, Sophie dragged Bruce through the whole station in search for 'Anna-banana'. Amelia set her way to head over to the Commissioner's office.

When she stepped in front of the door, a wave of nervousness hit her, and she shakily knocked on the door. Gordon summoned her in and smiled as though he were pleasantly surprised to see her.

"Ms. Bennet, it's nice to see you again." He said, following her eyes over to the small television set that read on the news 'You'd never guess she was kidnapped! At seven.' plastered on the screen along with a picture of her and Bruce walking out of the hospital with Sophie holding each of their hands -well, holding Bruce's as best she could, again, with her bad hand.

"They certainly work quickly." She remarked. It had not been twenty minutes ago when that happened.

"Yes well." Gordon said awkwardly, then cleared his throat. "Shall we begin?"

It had been at least an hour and a half when Gordon had finished questioning her. She had told him what she remembered about last night. -Leaving out the part of her coming back at Empress.

"May I ask what happened to Ryan Grey last night? He was my ex-husband, and I got notice that he and Officer Franklin had died last night." Gordon just looked at her like she was speaking a foreign tongue. Either it was her asking what happened, or it was the fact that she had been connected to both criminals, Amelia couldn't tell.

"An officer reported to me that they got into a fight over something and Firefly, Officer Franklin, shoved Ryan and they both fell out of the window." He reported gravely before his phone interrupted the mutual mourning, and he escorted her out of his office with some important news.

She was left with the shocker that Gordon had captured her biological daughter working for Firefly and/or Ryan.

"Only thirteen and already a criminal." She sighed out walking over to the holding cells where she saw almost a carbon copy of herself, only much younger. Amelia said nothing to the girl, although the girl seemed to have a spark of recognition in the girl's eyes. The girl, from Gordon's reports, had been in a stable family home before she started sneaking out to work for Ryan, and Amelia did not intend to complicate her life further by telling her that she was her mother.

She found Sophie playing with Bruce and 'Anna-banana' and they left after Sophie complained of being 'Really, really, really, really, _really, _hungry.'

"We better get going so this little girl doesn't just die." Amelia teased Sophie, who hid behind Amelia's legs when Gordon offered a friendly smile. "Sophie, say goodbye to Mr. Gordon." Amelia frowned when Sophie was still playing the shy card. "Sophie friends say bye to their friends."

"Bye Mr. Gordon. By Anna-banana!" Sophie said, giving each a quick hug around their legs.

~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~

"You're not going away like mommy and Thomas, are you?" Sophie asked as Amelia finished reading 'The Cat in the Hat' that night.

"No, honey, we're going away for a few days because a very good friend of mine went to a special place." She said, tucking the small child in. How was she to go about telling a five -almost six- year old that the man that you had married, tried to kill you and ended up dying by being tackled out of a window? "You're gonna stay with Aunt Gina while me a Bruce go visit my friend's family, okay honey?" Regina had never taken a liking to Ryan -now Amelia realizes it's because of what they did in high school, but she was still respectful when he died, she wasn't going to funeral. Partly because she despised him, and partly because Amelia needed someone to watch Sophie while she was at the funeral with Bruce; he was going to show moral support.

"Okay." She answered sleepily.

"Alright? So, get lots of sleep tonight and then we'll pack your things, and then Bruce-y is going to take us on a plane ride!" Amelia said, kissing the little girl on the forehead and exiting the room after turning off her light -making sure to turn on her fairy night-light.

"She asleep?" Bruce asked as she crawled into her bed.

"Getting there. Told her we're going to California in the morning." She answered lazily, resting her eyes. Bruce leaned over to lay a gentle kiss at the corner of her mouth, then wrap an arm around her waist, also closing his eyes.

~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~

The next morning, Amelia helped Sophie pack, taking care to pack all button up shirts -for easy changing with her cast- and packed her favorite 'fancy' dinosaur Leonard in her backpack. He wore a top hat and an over sized tie; hence the 'fancy' part.

The plane ride over was relatively serene. Sophie spent her time by the window of Bruce's private plane either gawking at the 'little lego people' down below, eating, or coloring.

The landing was a different story. Amelia had to explain three times that they would see the 'lego people' in a few days when they went back home. Then she complained of being too tired, and too hungry to do anything and wouldn't except going to see Ronald McDonald so, Bruce had to please her by promising to get special food at the hotel in bed.

"You're going to spoil her." Amelia told him after Sophie finished eating and was now sleeping soundly; hopefully for the rest of the night.

"We're on vacation, we don't have to worry about Gotham, or it's criminals for a few days. Let's enjoy it while we can. _Including _Sophie." He answered rubbing his hands in an up and down motion on her arms. Amelia sighed, knowing that he was right. "Now, while we're on the subject, I'm taking you out. Regina already agreed to watch over Sophie for us."

"But, there's no doubt you're taking me somewhere fancy and I only packed a black pencil skirt for the funeral and that's too business casual."

"Go look on the bed in the master bedroom." He told her turning her around and shoving her, gently, toward the door.

Amelia entered the bedroom, and was surprised to see the plain white box on the bed, wondering how it got all the way there from Gotham without her noticing. She apprehensively pulled the top of the box off, and started peeling away oh-so delicately at the tissue paper.

"It won't explode, you know." Bruce teased from the doorway. She continued her slow trek toward her goal of revealing the item in the box, and gasped looking at the black, sequined, drop waist, twenties style flapper dress that she'd been eying since she'd tried it on the first time Regina visited. "I thought you'd like it."

"You shouldn't have! It was so expensive! And you bought my car -which I fully intend to pay you back for."

"Yes I should have, no it wasn't, and no you're not. I bought that dress the day I saw you try it on." He said as she stepped into the bathroom to change.

"And what would have happened if I didn't end up falling for your charm and despised you?" She called out.

"I still would have given it to you."

"Really Bruce, you shouldn't have." She repeated, stepping out of the bathroom in it and walking over to Bruce, placing her hands on his shoulders to give him a quick peck on the lips.

"You look beautiful. Should we go?" He asked, holding out his arm for her.

The inside of the restaurant was cozy, and dark. All the chairs and booths were covered in red velvet and the tables were a black finished wood. Bruce got them a corner booth, with one in front of them; almost completely separated from the restaurant.

"This is really nice, Bruce." Amelia leaned over after the waitress to their order. Surprisingly to Amelia, the waitress didn't shoot her a look of jealousy, and Amelia thought Bruce was loosing his charm. Until she spotted the beautiful diamond ring on her finger. _I wonder if that will be me again someday? _

"Do you regret this? Us? Or even moving to Gotham?" Bruce asked her, feeling the need to discuss his worry from the other night.

"Bruce, you can't expect me to regret every little bad thing that comes my way, of course I don't. I've been happier with everyone in Gotham than I have since my Father was alive and me and Ryan were supposedly happy. The way I see it is, when something bad happens to you, you end up living with regrets. And if you live in the past with your regrets, you never really move on. You linger, and nothing becomes of your life. You simply waste away into nothing. So, my answer is no. And, I don't think I'll be leaving any time soon, so if that was a plot to get rid of, you'll have to work harder mister.

"No, of course I wasn't. I was just worried that after all that drama the other night, you would want to pack Sophie up and leave. I know for a fact that I want to spend at least a little more time with you." He confessed.

"How much time?" Amelia asked, taking his hand.

"As long as you want, I'll be here." He leaned over to kiss her before the waitress brought back their drinks. She gave Amelia a knowing smile before proceeding to take their orders.

"Is that Amelia? Oh, _mon enfant_!" A voice called out for Amelia, interrupting her and Bruce's resumed conversation after the waitress left. As the woman started to approach them, recognition sparked like fire in Amelia's eyes.

"Mom?" She asked, incredulously. Bruce just sat there, as if he didn't know what to do. From what Amelia had told him, she ran off to France a few days before Amelia's father had announced to her that was sick; Amelia guessed that her mother knew and couldn't bear it, so she ran. Amelia never forgave her for that. "What are you doing here?"

**Translations: **_Mon Enfant _- My child

**A/N: I felt it necessary for Amelia to see her kid. I mean, I would want to. haha**

**Also, the big confrontation between mother and daughter is approaching.**

**I'm not going to ramble today because I've been sick and confined to my house since Saturday, and I really feel like I'm going off the deep end.**

**Good? Bad? Lemme know!  
**


	16. Chapter 16

**Chapter 16 **

"Well I heard about Ryan and decided to come see you." She answered, a little confused as to why her daughter was acting so coldly.

"Since when do you care?" She asked. Why was her mother here? And it had been almost six years since she had last seen her mother -her father had gotten sick a first time, and had supposedly recovered when they found the lung cancer almost two years ago, so why all the sudden did she care about her? Claire Bennet sat there a minute, oblivious to why she was being treated this way by her daughter.

"Do you want me to give you two some privacy?" Bruce leaned over and asked as they sat in silence.

"Please don't, I don't know if I'll be able to handle all of this if you leave." She whispered back and Bruce nodded.

"Can't a mother visit her daughter? Who is this that you brought?" She asked, inviting herself to sit down at the table with them.

"Only when that mother doesn't run away with some French guy when her husband is sick with who knew what, and doesn't care about her daughter's well-being until six years later. This is my boyfriend, Bruce." She answered curtly. She was not in the mood to bond with this woman.

"Honey. I just couldn't take the stress of it all. Especially with all the financial troubles." Amelia resisted the urge to roll her eyes at her mother's excuse.

"And what about all those vows you took at your wedding? Through _sickness _and in health? For richer or for _poorer_? Or did you guys just leave those one's out? The one time he could have used your support the most, and you run off? He was sick, all the while the company was threatening to fail, and you run away to France with your beau that you're probably not with anymore and 'forget' about all your troubles, and left your daughter to take care of your husband. You know what you could have done during those financial troubles? Gotten rid of my cell phone, gotten rid of the staff, gotten rid of the cable, we could have downsized, and so many more things. But you were only focused on yourself. I know I won't make the same mistake with my daughter." Amelia lectured her. It gave her an odd feeling of complacency when she finally got all the things off of her chest that she'd been harboring for years. There was a weight that just lifted off her shoulders.

"I didn't think your father loved me anymore." She answered quietly, hanging her head and looking down at her hands.

"He talked about you constantly. When he got sick again, right before he died, he talked about you. He wasn't all there with all the medication he was on and some days he would stay awake later than usual because he had convinced himself that you were coming back, and he had to see you. You didn't even call." She whispered the last part, and Bruce gave her hand a reassuring squeeze. She heard her mother sniffle a little, and she felt almost bad but, she thought of her father and how much he had needed her and she was probably out and about drinking French drinks and canoodling under the Arc de Triomphe. Then, her mother's head snapped up.

"Your daughter? Are you...pregnant?" She asked.

"No. I've adopted." She answered shortly. Then she saw their waitress making her way over to the table. "All I'd like to say is, thank you for coming but, our food is here and we'd like to eat in peace. Maybe I'll see you some other time."

~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~

After dinner, Amelia took Bruce around to see the sights of her hometown, and eventually just walked back to the hotel instead of taking a cab.

"I had a really nice night. You know, aside from a not-so-pleasant surprise reunion with my mom. It's nice to visit my hometown." Amelia told him, climbing into the big plush bed, while taking her hair down from her messy bun.

"I'd say today was pretty good, minus that little part, yes." He agreed leaning over to kiss her sweetly on the lips. "Are you sure you're okay to go tomorrow?"

"I have to. I should be there for Ryan's mom. And I was his wife. I'm kind of expected to be there. If anything, I'm just going to offer support for Mrs. Grey." She said, turning over to switch off the light.

Just as she was about to drift off she heard the door open, and she panicked a little. She looked over at Bruce, who was sound asleep on his stomach, snoring lightly, with his arm possessively around Amelia's waist.

"Mia?" Sophie's voice called out into the dark room timidly.

"Yeah, sweetie?" Amelia answered tiredly, leaning up in bed.

"I had a bad dream, can I sleep with you and Bruce-y?" She asked nervously. Here was another parental thing Amelia had been nervous about. Many people told her to tell the child no, and that they should learn to sleep in their own beds. But how do you deny a small girl that just had a nightmare? Amelia sighed, quietly, and agreed.

"Of course you can, honey. Climb on up." Sophie ran over to the bed as quickly as her little feet would carry her and she climbed in between Bruce and Amelia happily, falling asleep almost instantly. Amelia smiled and fell asleep soon after.

~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~

Walking up to Ryan's reserved plot where the outdoor funeral would be held, Amelia and Bruce looked as if they had just walked out of the twenties. Amelia had on black pointed toe flats, a black pencil skirt, a white blouse, a black fitted suit jacket, with black gloves and a plum cloche hat on top of a low side bun done right behind her right ear. Bruce was wearing a fitted black suit, complete with the vest underneath and a forest green tie.

The funeral itself was a lovely thing and everyone there seemed grateful to Amelia for even coming. It was an odd thing, to some people, Amelia being there. She thought they would expect her to be there, but she put herself in someone else's shoes. He had been a terrible husband, they probably knew about what happened when she was in high school, he had tried to kill her, kidnapped her, beat her, and then get in a fight and died arguing about how the hit man he hired to kill her couldn't do it. Then she saw why people were perplexed. Who would expect a woman who had been emotionally and physically abused her whole adulthood up until then, to be at her ex's funeral?

She greeted Ryan's most recent wife, who looked about six months pregnant. _That's probably why he was so eager to marry her. _She congratulated her on the baby and comforted her about losing Ryan. She seemed very nice, and Amelia wondered what possessed her to fall for a guy like Ryan. But then again, people probably wondered what possessed _her _to fall for a guy like Ryan. Nicole, was her name as Amelia learned, apologized for everything Ryan did to her, and she confided that Ryan had seemed like he had changed since she'd known him in the past year. She laughed bitterly and said that she guessed it wasn't true.

"I hope you'll come back to the house and see everyone?" Evelyn Grey asked Amelia and Bruce.

"Of course, Evelyn. I just want to visit my Father before we go." Amelia informed her.

"Oh of course, take your time. I know you don't get to come here that often." She said, placing a hand on her shoulder and moving on the shake Bruce's hand. "It has been very nice to meet you. I hate to admit that you're more than likely treating her better than my Ryan ever did. Take care."

"Likewise, Mrs. Grey. I'm very sorry for your loss." Bruce gave her a quick, comforting, hug before walking over to Roger Bennet's plot.

"I can't believe it's been almost two years already." Amelia sniffled. Bruce put his hands on her shoulders as a comforting gesture.

They spent a few more minutes there, and Amelia set down the flowers she had brought for him in the small vase they had set up, before heading over to the Grey's estate to see everyone Amelia hadn't seen in a while.

~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~

"And I'm going to Bennet headquarters tomorrow to discuss the plan about the homeless shelters, then Monday morning we'll head home." Amelia explained to Bruce as they entered the hotel room that evening.

"Mia! Help me, the monster's gonna get me!" Sophie came running out of her little room, giggling and Regina was following behind, crouching like she was gonna get her.

"Oh hey, you two." She said, straightening herself. "How was everything?"

"Fine. Emotional, you know how those things are." Amelia confided. "How was everything here?"

"Just fine. Sophie and I were about to watch 'Cinderella', care to join?" Regina said, heading over to set up the t.v.

"Sure, why not? Bruce, will you order some dinner while I help Sophie get into her pajamas?"

~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~

"How long have we been dating now, two weeks? It feels like so much longer." Amelia told Bruce that night after he put Sophie to bed.

"I think we've been through much more than a normal couple." He concluded, climbing in next to her.

"I just feel like, we've been together longer, and I know I want to spend as much time with you as I can." Amelia had been dreading this conversation since she had been kidnapped. After that night she realized that she wanted Bruce and Sophie in her life for a long time. Perhaps even forever. But there were always doubts. What if Bruce didn't want to spend the rest of his life with her? What if he only did when Sophie was out of the picture? What if he didn't want kids? What if he only wanted to with her if they could have their own kid, not someone else's?

But their conversation the night before, confirmed that Bruce wanted to spend as much time with Amelia as she would allow. And to that point in time, that was forever.

"Well, you already know I want to spend as much time with you as you'll let me. And I guess that means we're stuck together forever." He said, before leaning in a kissing her on the lips; while making the decision in his head.

He was going to ask her to marry him soon. Maybe not now, or this week, or this month. But soon.

~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~

The next day, while Amelia was giving her presentation for the Gotham homeless shelters with Wayne Enterprises, Bruce called Alfred to dig out his Mother's engagement ring, which had been his grandmother's and great grandmothers. It was a family heirloom and it would only feel right if Amelia were wearing it.

Hundreds of girls had been eying it since Bruce made his comeback as the billionaire playboy. But one would get to wear it.

~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~

After they landed, while they were eating dinner at the manor, Amelia got a call that they had approved the plans for the shelter. The fundraiser would be held six weeks from then.

**A/N: Sooo, here's the big confrontation, the funeral, and plans for the future! Yaaay! The story progressing again! Haha. I hope you liked it! I'm sorry if the story-line/time-line of Amelia's father seem erratic, I was on crack when I wrote this like a month ago. Lmao.**

**If you would like to see the ring, I can post the link in my bio on my profile.**

**Good? Bad? Lemme know!**


	17. Chapter 17

**Chapter 17 **

**A/N: For Amelia's party dress, I was thinking like the dress in Nicki Minaj's video for Moment For Life but instead of the baby blue, a midnight blue and instead of dark blue jewel pieces, golden accents.**

It had been nearly six weeks since the incident that pretty much solidified Bruce's and Amelia's relationship, and everything in Gotham had been pretty calm since then. Summer was starting to set in, the media was still hounding them about going on a vacation together, the mobsters were still wreaking havoc in the underground of Gotham, and business was still boring as ever.

The blueprints for 'Save Haven', the new homeless shelter, with a special children's wing named 'Sophie's Place' had been laid out and confirmed in both companies and Bruce and Amelia were hosting a fundraiser for it in Bruce's estate. Little did Amelia know, it was also doubling as an engagement party.

"Killing two birds with one stone, Master Wayne?" Alfred asked, handing Bruce the velvet box that held the ring.

"You know how I am, Alfred. That is, _if _she says yes." Bruce mentioned, adjusting his bow tie in the mirror.

"Stop fidgeting. You look handsome." Amelia said, taking Bruce's hands away from his tie it took him a solid ten minutes to tie. Bruce took the sight of Amelia so dressed up in. She was wearing a midnight blue Greek, empire waist, long dress, her hair in a fancy up-do with a few curled pieces hanging down, completed with a few gold pieces of jewelry and gold strappy high heels. She looked like a picture of a goddess in Bruce's eyes.

"And you look fantastic." He leaned in to kiss her on the lips, and Amelia felt that little spark that she always did. When they broke apart she was blushing. "Join me out on the balcony?" He asked, holding one hand out for her, and one hand was in his pocket turning the box around and around in a nervous habit. To his pleasure, she smiled sweetly and took his hand. They had been talking about serious commitment for a little while now, and they had only been dating for about two and half months but, they spent almost all their time together, and they weren't really your normal couple. He had heard her confiding to Regina that 'When you meet the right person, you just know.' and that excited Bruce and really motivated him to ask her. So, he waited until the fundraiser when it could also double as an engagement party, if she says yes.

He took her out to the balcony, and leaned on the edge, not releasing her hand, and he looked at her seriously; but she could still detect happiness in his eyes.

"Amelia, we've been discussing commitment, and our future lately. Since you've come to Gotham you've turned my life upside down for a number of reasons. That first night here, I thought I didn't stand a chance and months later, I'm in love with you. I know we haven't been together long, but I feel like you're the one. So, Amelia Peyton Bennet, I love you and I want to spend the rest of my life with you. Will you marry me?" He asked, getting down on his knee and pulling out the velvet box. Amelia sat there, dumbfounded, with the hand that Bruce wasn't holding placed firmly over her mouth.

"Yes, Bruce, yes. Of course. I love you so much." She finally answered after, Bruce felt, an eternity. He slipped his mother's old ring into her ring finger and got up to kiss her.

"It's a good thing you said yes, because the security men have this whole thing on tape." Bruce admitted jokingly.

During the party, many ladies came up to congratulate them, and to tell them that they and their husbands were going to donate plenty to the shelter. Regina squealed when she saw the antique ring, and Sophie asked if Bruce-y and Amelia were finally getting married. They laughed and answered yes, and Bruce picked her up after she notified him that she needed to tell him something.

"It's about time Bruce-y. Thought I was gonna haveta marry you myself." The now six year old scolded the man for not getting his act together.

"I think you've been hanging out with aunt Gina too long, young lady." Amelia teased. "Now, go find Anna-banana, she was looking for you. Mia has to go talk to people."

As Amelia made her way over to the makeshift stage they had set up, with Bruce holding onto her hand, many people congratulated them both on their engagement. She took hold of the microphone, while Bruce sat at the table on the stage.

"I'd like to thank you all for making it out tonight." Amelia started after waiting for the crowd to die down. "And I'd like to thank you all for your donations. Nobody should feel bad if they couldn't give much, everything that you gave is very much appreciated, and every little penny counts. I've been informed that we're starting construction in a month from today, and the facility will be located near Major Crimes Unit and the local middle and high schools, somewhere in between the city and the Narrows. Hopefully, eventually, we'll be able to open shelters all around the city, state, and country. We're just taking everything one step at a time. So, thank you." She handed the microphone off to Bruce, and took his place at the table. Dinner was being prepared, and she was ready to go over to the grand dining room to, very eloquently put, stuff her face.

"Well, I don't think I could match that if I tried." Bruce started, chuckling easily. "I'd also like to thank you all for the donations, but I'd also like to thank you for an entirely different reason. I'd like to announce my engagement to Amelia, to those who didn't already know. This is also doubling as our engagement party. Now, I know what you're thinking, we haven't been together for very long. And no, it's not going to be a shotgun wedding. My parents, family, and friends always told me 'When you find the right girl, you'll just know.' And I always looked at them like they were insane. But, when I started seeing Amelia, I knew. She's one of the most intelligent, beautiful, sassy, independent, and outspoken women I know. And I know that she's the right one for me. Now, if you'll all join us in the grand dining room, we'll be happy to start dinner once everyone joins us." Many of the older women were reduced to tears, partly at Bruce's heartfelt speech, and partly because they never thought the arrogant playboy would ever commit and settle down. Many of the younger women were closer to tears for a different reason exactly. Bruce and Amelia led everyone to the grand dining room -not to be confused with the regular dining room; this one was for big parties.

The grand dining room looked the same as the ballroom, with tables and chairs set up all throughout the room. Every seat was to be filled, and people were filing in and finding their assigned tables.

As people filed in, Bruce kept his eyes on Amelia, only breaking contact if he absolutely needed to.

After a lovely dinner of roasted chicken, garlic roasted potatoes, and asparagus, -'Keep it simple.' Amelia had requested- everyone moved back out to the ballroom where people could dance or continue to socialize as they had been before dinner. Amelia had gone to put Sophie to bed, and then decided that she should socialize with Gotham's elite girlfriends.

As she walked over, she got many congratulations and requests to see the ring from random associates of Wayne Enterprises' wives.

"Congratulations- uh," A lovely young woman approached Amelia in a slinky maroon dress, she had red lipstick and dark eye make-up and her hair in a curly up-do. Her dress was floor length, and had a deep v-neck, with triangular cut outs at the sides and barely-there back. The cut outs were lined with black sequins.

"Amelia." She said, smiling at the young lady.

"I'm Daniella. My friends and I," She pointed back to thee posse of young women, also in slinky dresses. "didn't think Bruce would ever settle down. We went out a couple times, and he also went out with Chastity. We thought he'd be a perpetual playboy." She told Amelia, she thought she sounded a pretentious, and also a bit...bitter? _I know what she's trying to do. She's trying to harm my relationship with Bruce._

"Well, I met him my first night in Gotham and he tried to get me to go to dinner with him, and I turned him down. Took us almost two months to go out finally." Amelia mentioned, not at all pretentious. Just stating simple fact. She wasn't going to involve herself in useless drama with women she'd never see again.

"So, Amelia, please fill us in on some girl-gossip. Is he any good in bed?" She asked Amelia, taking her arm and leading her to the drink table. Amelia could see the eager looks on some of the other girls faces, and she noticed Chastity's glare. _I bet she slept with him. _And it didn't bother her, really. Whatever he chose to do in the past was his business, and none of hers._  
_

"Bruce has been very respectful throughout our relationship and observes the fact that I don't want any sexual relations until after marriage. I'm sure you could ask Chastity, if you really wanted to know." She said somewhat smugly, taking back her arm and going back over to Bruce. "Please forgive my rudeness to some of your, ahem, ex-girlfriends. I can't abide useless people." She whispered in Bruce's ear when she reached him. Bruce looked over to see what she was talking about, and he saw Daniella, Chastity, Joan, and Georgia all glaring over at the couple.

"I'm sorry. They must be here with someone, I wouldn't invite them. I'll ask them to leave."

"No. They're fine, it didn't come to that. I was just a little harsh on the poor girls." She smirked, mimicking Bruce's

"If anything, I think some of them deserve it." He admitted with a smile.

The party progressed painfully slow, according to Amelia and she felt like a lost puppy following Bruce around, while she didn't have -or want to make, for that matter- friends with the trust fund group, and she found Regina surrounded by around six men and they were all laughing about something. She decided not to intervene, since Regina desperately needed to move on from her ex.

As people started leaving around eleven, Bruce mentioned that she could head back home and change to do the rounds and he'd kick the remainder of guests out around twelve, at the latest. She nodded and kissed him before heading down the hall to check on Sophie. She had her hand on the doorknob before she heard the steps of someone approaching her.

"I just checked on her, miss Amelia. Sound asleep. Would you like me to make a bed for you and Regina?" He asked, carrying a tray of empty champagne glasses back to the kitchen.

"No, thank you. I'll sleep in the master and Regina said she'd like to sleep at home." She mentioned

"Very well. I shall see you in the very early morning." Amelia smiled and nodded and Alfred made his way over to the kitchen. Amelia met Regina by the door, who was still talking to one of the guys who was by her earlier that night. She said her goodbyes to him, before he reminded her of their date the following Friday, and Amelia drove Regina home.

"So, who was that?" Amelia asked about three-quarters of the way to the house.

"His name is David. He's really sweet. Much nicer than Greg. We're going out next Friday." She mentioned. He was baby faced, and had dark brown eyes like Bruce. His hair looked unruly, but Regina said 'He makes it work.'

~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~

Around one, Empress was on top of the MCU building, either waiting for Batman to get there or waiting for Gordon to come up; both of which were bound to happen. Crime had been on the low-level tonight, and Empress could have really only used Batman's help for one thing. It was a drug bust near Arkham and they ended up getting away because Empress spotted an escapee roaming around muttering to himself. She bitterly told the staff that if this guy could get out, someone like the Joker could get out. They tried to mention that he was smarter than he looked but Empress just looked at them incredulously.

At long last, Empress heard the familiar, yet nearly silent, swoop of Batman's cape and didn't turn from her perch at the edge of the building.

"You're late." She said, with a smirk.

"I was a little busy. Little girls with nightmares don't bode well with Vigilantes." He mentioned, as she turned around he noticed the small slint of silver around her neck with the small ring attached to it. She noticed him looking at it, and kid it underneath her body armor.

"I wanted to have it with me but I would forgive myself if something happened to it if it were on my finger. As for the little girls with nightmares, can't really help you there." She smiled.

~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~

"I'm starting to think I should buy a second suit to keep here." Amelia joked as they entered the Batcave through the waterfall.

"You won't need it after we get married." Bruce mentioned. Amelia nodded, it was so strange to think of herself as engaged again. She remembered it as if it were yesterday that she met Bruce and told him that she wasn't looking for a relationship and almost five months later, she was engaged.

"About that. I'm all for moving here when we get married and all. But, I'm in love with that house and I'd hate to see it go. Especially since I've gotten myself set up in my lair too. So, I was thinking, Regina would live there and I'd continue to pay for it. I have plenty of money and I know Regina can't pay for it herself. Since I'm going to be living here, why not just let her live there?" Amelia suggested the idea to Bruce nervously. She was afraid he would object to her spending her money on a house she wasn't living in. Finally, after Bruce changed and thought it over, he nodded and informed her that he thought it was a good idea because then he'd know that Regina was in a safe neighborhood and Sophie would be safe when Regina babysat her. "Oh, and I was also hoping you could see if Regina could get a secretarial position at Wayne Enterprises?"

"I'm sure I can get something. Anything else, another car? Maybe some new clothes? How about a whole mall?" He teased and she punched him in the shoulder. "Oh, you wanna go?" He exclaimed playfully, his manly chuckle echoed throughout the cave.

"Yeah, show me what you got!" She got into a playfully defensive stance. She giggled uncontrollably as he left his own defensive stance and started to tickle her. All you could hear was Bruce's throaty laugh, and Amelia's begging for him to stop until they heard Alfred clear his throat and then chuckle, giving them both a knowing smile.

"If you're going to act like children, I'm going to treat you as such. Off to bed, both of you." He said with a smirk. Amelia nodded sheepishly with a blush and clasped her hands in front of her, walking towards the lift; with Bruce in tow.

"I am gonna take you up on you buying me a mall. That could come in handy." She said playfully as they rode the lift up to Bruce's study.

**A/N: I have a picture for the wedding dress that I'll have Amelia wear, I'll put it on my profile. I also have actresses picked out for who I'd like to play Amelia, Regina, Ryan, Violet, Kara, and Tyler. (I think those are my only main OCs...) I have none for Sophie because there aren't that many five year old actresses. I know all those are long shots but I think they could all pull it off...**

**(Delete before publishing: Amelia: Rose Byrne (With an American accent instead of her English one)  
**

**Regina: Rachel Bilson or Leighton Meester**

**Ryan: Jim Sturgess or James McAvoy**

**Violet: Camilla Belle**

**Kara: Gong Li**

**Tyler: Lee Pace or Joe Anderson**

**David: Eli Marienthal)**

**P.S. The part at the part when she tells off Bruce's friends then asks him to forgive her I stole from Firefly, so props to Joss.**

**Also, Engagement and fundraiser! It's been tackled! lol**

**Good? Bad? Lemme know!  
**


	18. Chapter 18

**Chapter 18**

**A/N: Well, I've been reading a lot of Bruce/Oc stories (as I usually do) and I've noticed that a lot of the little things that happen in the various stories seem to happen in my story. I'd just like to clear up, I write these chapters in advance and I've had this chapter written since the beginning of February, so I'd just like to say that every story line in each chapter is an original plot and is by no means stolen from another story. Just pure coincidence.**

When Amelia woke, she dragged herself out of bed to find out that it was still dark outside. She groaned when she realized that she hadn't gotten much, or any, sleep; but she felt very energized. She looked over and saw Bruce sprawled out on top of the bed and breathing slowly, and when she went out into the hallway, she saw Sophie outside the door sleeping as well. She smiled and picked her up, moving her to the bed with Bruce.

When she went to look at the time, the clock display was either broken or dead because it was blank. She moved out into the hallway to go to the manor's kitchen to see if she could find something to eat, and something that would tell her the time. About halfway to the kitchen, she heard a crash of something glass hit the ballroom, marble, floor and she went to investigate.

Upon entering the room, she gasped as she looked at the face of her ex-husband, Ryan Grey. He glared hardly over at her, the green tint to his skin made her feel sick. He started walking towards her slowly, and she saw Firefly coming at her from the other side, blocking her only way out.

"Hello, _wifey._" Ryan drawled.

"Ryan? Wha-? You can't be here... I- I watched you die." She could feel the tears filling her eyes as she thought about these people being alive.

"Well, we're back. And we're not too happy about what's happening." He crossed his arms in front of him as he continued the long walk through the extravagant ballroom. "How could you marry pretty boy after you were already married to me? That's almost an ultimate betrayal. And even after leading Tyler here on?" He gestured over to Firefly, who had now removed his mask, and those icy blue eyes were glaring into Amelia's gray eyes.

"I didn't mean..." She started, her voice coming out in a meek whisper.

"Amelia." A warm, deep, familiar voice called out to her, but she couldn't see his face. "Amelia, you know this is all your fault. This has always been your fault. And now you've brought another man and even a child into your world. You're disappointing me." Amelia finally let the tears that had building up, fall out of her eyes. It was bad enough that Ryan was chastising her, but when your dead best friend, your dead _Father _comes back to tell you that he's disappointed in you, there's no worse feeling.

"Dad? I'm sorry, I didn't mean for any of this to happen. I'm sorry, I know you're disappointed I couldn't be what you wanted me to be!" She was sobbing now, and she just wanted to go back to Bruce's bed with Sophie and pretend like this never happened, like she never woke up. She was about to crumple onto the ground, trying to disappear in the marble when someone grabbed her. She thought it had been Bruce coming to comfort her, like he always seemed to. Like he did when she had her Father's death anniversary and didn't leave the house all day. Then she felt a second pair of hands on the other side. And instead of comfort, she was shoved roughly forward and she felt hands encircle her throat a little too tightly. She started gasping for air when her brain finally registered that she couldn't breath anymore, and she ever tried to claw the hands off of her neck, through pure instinct.

"An eye for an eye right, baby?" Ryan's voice said into her ear from her left side.

All through the ballroom, you could hear her coughing noises while she tried to force a little air through her compressed windpipe. She tried to kick her feet up to make them loosen their hold, but with her blurring vision the only thing she could make out were those piercing brown eyes she looked into almost every day, and that stupid little smirk he always seemed to wear when they were surrounded by the media. She tried to say the name Bruce, hoping that he would hear her despair and loosen his grip but his smirk just widened as she couldn't force the word out.

Everything in her body seemed to be numb, except for her face, everything that she did felt like she was burning. The tears rolling down her face was like hot wax being poured onto her and her throat felt like it was on fire. She felt, and saw, the darkness setting in as the edges of her eyes turned dark, and it was slowly setting in and moving closer toward the center. Distantly she could her her name being said with other things along with 'It's your fault.', 'It's always been your fault.', 'You had it coming.', and 'You brought this on yourself.' All around her, like the voices were circling her.

She dropped her hands to her side, realizing that it was a lost cause and she wasn't going to make it out alive. She messed up. She closed her eyes, and willed this to be over. She had accepted her fate, now just let her go. She prayed that this would be over and she could just go.

Then, clear as day, she heard the urgent voice of her daughter Sophie calling out to her. "Mia? Mia? Mommy! Mia!" Her eyes snapped open and through her clearing vision she saw the little form running toward her, she tried to shake her head and call out for her to stay back, but she still couldn't force the words out. The pain was unbearable and the iron grip lessened just a bit, and she took a deep breath and let out a bloodcurdling scream-

~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~

Amelia's eyes snapped open, and she sat up in bed with a strangled gasp, the scream still echoed through her head and her throat still burned from the imaginary pressure. She felt the tears still rolling down her face, and she broke out into a new round of sobs. She laid her head back down on Bruce's pillow, and felt the wetness as proof of her nightmare, proof of her cries.

She felt a protective arm around her waist and felt a small amount of weight sit itself on her midsection and she opened her eyes to see Sophie looking down worriedly at her, and looked over to see the same look of concern on Bruce's face.

"Hey, it's okay. Are you alright?" Bruce asked, lovingly, wiping the stray tears from her cheeks. She nodded, not sure if she could speak normally yet. "Do you want to talk about it?"

"Not...In front of Sophie." She managed to croak out. At that moment, Alfred walking through the door with a metal tray with Bruce's and Amelia's breakfasts on them along with a small glass of water and a bottle of Advil next to the french toast, eggs, and bacon on the plates accompanied by a glass of Amelia's chocolate milk, and Bruce's protein drink.

"I heard the racket while I was making breakfast and thought someone would need an Advil. Come along, Sophie. I have a special stack of french toast saved just for you." Alfred set the tray between Bruce and Amelia and held out his hand for Sophie, that she took happily once she heard the words 'French toast', and 'Just for you'.

"Tell me what happened?" Bruce asked, after taking a sip and grimacing at the bitter taste of the protein drink. He'd never gotten used to the taste. As Amelia relived the nightmare, she felt herself getting upset again, especially after repeating her father's words. She couldn't begin to explain the sensation of being strangled to Bruce, but he did his best to understand. He hugged her reassuringly and kissed her to let her know that he was there and that he wouldn't let anything happen to her, not that it could anyway.

"It was just hard, seeing -or rather hearing- my dad; even in my subconscious. It's just even worse that it wasn't anything good, and I can't help but think that he was speaking directly to me. I feel like this is all my fault. I feel like those people died because of me."

"Amelia, look at me," Bruce put his fingers under her chin and made her look at him. "Firefly may have wanted to kill you, but he wanted to kill me too. He would have come out either way. None of this is your fault. I know how you feel. One of my best friends was killed by the Joker last year. I know how it feels to be responsible for someone's death and it ate away at me for months. I finally got over it when you showed up but, I still had to get Alfred to lecture me on why I couldn't let myself wallow in this self pity anymore, and I could certainly make him do it again. I love you, I don't blame you, neither does Regina, Sophie, Alfred, or any of your family and friends. The media may blame me and you, but I don't." Amelia sighed in defeat and looked down, ashamed. She still felt a slight tinge of guilt, but it wasn't as dominant in her mind as it had been for the past six weeks. He was right, she had other things to do. She had citizens to protect, a child and friends to protect, work to do, and a wedding to plan. She had no time to linger in the past.

"You're completely right. I'm sorry. I'll do my best to forgive myself." She said. Bruce lifted her face to his again, and kissed her deeply, passionately, on the lips. "Now, I have to go to work, I'm going out to lunch with Kara, Regina, and Violet, and then I'm going to pick up some wedding stuff and hunt down a planner." Amelia said, determined.

"Okay, have fun, be safe." Bruce reminded her before sending her on her way out the door.

"Sophie, come here and give me a hug, Mia has to go to work." Amelia called out after changing into her skirt suit and retrieving her keys.

"Bye, Mia! I love you!" She ran over to give Amelia a dainty hug and Amelia kissed her forehead.

"I love you too. You listen to Alfred, he's in charge, okay?" Sophie nodded and ran back over to where 'The Backyardigans' was playing on Nick Jr. "Bye, Alfred, thank you for babysitting today!" Alfred mentioned that it was no problem, and that he was happy to fill in whenever Regina couldn't.

~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~

"Good morning, Amelia, congratulations." Violet smiled up from her desk. They had become quite good friends since Amelia first arrived. Violet was a young one, still in need of some guidance, and Amelia fit the role of surrogate sister. "Your messages are waiting on your desk, and Kara is preparing the presentation for your meeting today."

"Thank you, Violet." Amelia opened the door to her office and found about a dozen bouquets of various flowers as congratulations. One bouquet that stood out, was a purplish blue bouquet of hydrangeas. There was a card that Amelia pulled out, and it read;

_Have a good day at work. I love you._

_-Bruce._

Amelia smiled and put the card onto her desk in the frame of a picture of herself, Bruce, and Sophie at the zoo sitting on a chrome model of a manatee, Sophie's favorite animal.

"So, show me the ring!" Kara called out into Amelia's office. "Oh, those are pretty!" She said, pointing at all the flowers. Amelia held out her ring finger for Kara to look at. She squealed when she saw the large round cut diamond set in the ring, with smaller version of that cut in every other space and small emerald cut sapphires filling in the squares. There were intricate cut diamonds along the edges until the band where it went under the finger where the white gold band sat. "Oh, it's so pretty!"

"Thank you. It was Bruce's mom's, grandmother's, great grandmother's, and well, a lot more greats and grandmother's." She said with a laugh.

The meeting progressed with the builders for Safe Haven slowly, and after the meeting finally came to a close, and they had to prepare some things for their meeting with Wayne Enterprises after lunch, it was time for Amelia to go pick up Regina for lunch.

"I'll meet you at the bistro, I have to go pick up Regina." Amelia waved at the girls and headed over to the parking garage.

When she pulled up to the house, she turned off the car and walked up to the door.

"Regina? Let's go!" She called out while closing the door.

"I'm coming!" She yelled running down the stairs and grabbing her purse.

~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~

"So, Bruce and I were talking, and we think that you should live in the house when we get married just so I can still have my lair, you can have somewhere to live on your own, and I have somewhere safe to take Sophie when she's not at the manor." Amelia mentioned as she pulled out of the street that she lived on, back toward the city.

"Are you serious? I'd love that, but I couldn't pay for it." Regina said, disappointed.

"That's the thing. I'm still going to be paying for it. I have plenty of money that I'm making with the company and Bruce has everything covered at the Manor.

"I couldn't let you do that." Regina rejected the idea. It took Amelia a few more minutes of persuading before Regina finally agreed. Through the rest of the drive, Amelia told Regina about her nightmare. "Oh, hon. Are you alright?"

"Yes. I think it's just the stress of everything that's happening." She said as they entered the restaurant, seeing the other two girls. "Hello everyone."

"Hey. So, tell us, have you started planning the wedding?" Violet asked

"I just got engaged! But, no, I've been meaning to start looking for a wedding planner. I also wanted Regina to be my maid of honor and you two to be bride's maids."

"I could do it." Regina blurted, succeeding in silencing the whole table form their excited plans of being bride's maids. "I've been looking into career options. I haven't given this one much thought, but I could try. At least I know you won't hate me if I mess something up." Regina joked.

"That would be great. And no, I definitely wouldn't hate you." She said with a smile

The rest of the afternoon proceeded to pass by at a relatively slow pace, which was a relief for Amelia, considering all the things that have happened lately, and as soon as she got home from picking up bridal magazines at the store, and being hounded by paparazzi, she crashed on the couch and didn't wake until almost dinner.

"Oh great, Amelia and Bruce on the news...Yet again! Why can't they just let you guys alone." Amelia heard Regina mumble from the arm chair.

"Turn it up, I want to hear." Amelia grumbled, opening her eyes.

_'...It seems our very own playboy billionaire is getting hitched? Insiders say that Bruce proposed last night and held an engagement party on the same night as their fundraiser for the homeless shelter, they raised almost 1.2 million dollars, and sources also say they saw the fiancee, Amelia Bennet -soon to be Wayne- shopping for bridal magazines. An insider tells us that the bride's best friend is also planning the wedding as well as playing Maid of honor. Photographers for Gotham's Insider Magazine saw the bride-to-be out to lunch with coworkers and best friend discussing wedding plans. Photographers also caught sight of the ring which has been rumored to be a family heirloom passed through the generations, the last person to wear it was Mrs. Martha Wayne before the tragic night that she was killed. Let's just hope that Amelia can wear it, and handle Bruce's lifestyle enough to keep it. Because we've already confirmed that many girls' hearts are just shattered as their chances with the billionaire are now lost. In other news...'_

"It's ridiculous that they make more of a big deal of their 'billionaire playboy' getting married than they do for the anniversary of Thomas' and Martha's deaths. They basically made this city what it is and all they care about it who's engagement ring I'm wearing." Amelia groused. She had visited the memorial for Thomas and Martha with Bruce when the anniversary came up, and shared a few words about how she wished she could have met them, and how much she wished they could have been there for the wedding. Bruce had been abnormally silent that day, and Amelia sat with him in the study with a couple glasses of wine and a romantic comedy that they both agreed on instead of doing their nightly duties. "Well, it doesn't matter. Let them think what they want. I have to make dinner, and get ready to go out." Amelia said with determination. She wasn't going to let gossipers get her down. Not that day.

**A/N: I have no idea where this chapter came from. I just knew she needed some aftershock of events after the whole Ryan/Firefly ordeal. Just boring stuff.**

**I'm excited, this chapter was almost 3,000 words long which is astounding for me. XD**

**Anywhooo. I hope you liked it!**

**Good? Bad? Lemme know!  
**


	19. Chapter 19

**Chapter 19**

"Master Bruce, there's a young lady here to see you." Alfred announced from the doorway of the master bedroom. Bruce quirked an eyebrow, wondering who would be visiting at eight o'clock and was surprised to see a petite blond with a doctors coat, and thick rimmed glasses atop her head, standing in the foyer.

"Harleen?" Bruce called out, she was a doctor at Arkham and he had gone out with her a few times, but she wasn't all there so Bruce stopped asking her out. They kept in touch every once in a while but he hadn't seen her since the night he told her they should just be friends, right after he caught the Joker as Batman.

"Bruce, puddin'! How are ya?" The small girl with the loud, Jersey accented voice called out.

"Just fine, what are you doing here?" He asked, genuinely curious as to why she just showed up at his house.

"I just got off my shift at Arkham, my most recent patient is just a handful, -but I can't really talk about him, patient doctor confidentiality, you know- and I thought you might want to go out for a drink or somethin'! It's been a while since we went out, Brucey!" She said in her normal tone of excitement. Bruce wondered if this woman ever watched the news or read a magazine, or even a newspaper. Did she not realize that he was engaged to be married, and very much in love?

"I didn't know if you knew already or not but, I'm engaged." Bruce mentioned awkwardly. "To be married." He clarified.

"Oh, well," He normally perky voice went down a few decibels. "I can just go then. See ya 'round!" She perked up and walked out the door as if nothing happened.

"Forgive me for saying but, that woman continues to confuse me." Alfred mentioned, heading back to the kitchen

"That was extremely suspicious. I'll look into who she's seeing at Arkham and try to access video files sometime soon. Just make sure to keep an extra eye out while I'm gone." Bruce ordered, making his way to the study so he could change into his batsuit.

~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~

"I need you to keep an eye out for a woman name Harleen Quinzel." Batman said to Empress as he approached her on top of an insurance building, looking for signs of trouble. "Bruce went out with her a few times in the past, but he stopped the relationship and she recently approached him, not knowing he was engaged. I don't know if she'll do harm to Amelia after she finds out who he's engaged to, but the whole thing was suspicious so, keep an eye out." Batman mentioned, talking about their alter egos as different people in case anyone was listening.

"I will." Was all she said. She was testing new equipment that Lucius brought over to Bruce, it let you listen to what was going on in the direction that you pointed the receiver. It seemed like she was listening into a conversation pretty intently.

"Drug deal 143 Beaker road, teen fight in the alley about a block down, and a lost child across the street." She informed him, removing the earpiece form her ear. "I can take the teen fight, and I'm going to take the child to children's services or his parents. You take the drug deal." Batman nodded and told her to hang on to take them down from the roof.

"Soon we'll have a safe place to take children like that." Batman mentioned before running over to where the drug deal was happening.

As Empress made her way over to the alleyway where the teens were engaged in a fist fight, with multiple others rooting them on, she noticed the teen club next door where the fight probably started. The chanting of the teens egging the two boys on to fight eventually dwindled as they saw Empress making her way down the alley.

"Hey, hot super hero! Help us out here!" One of the boys called out.

"What is the problem?" She asked, breaking the two livid boys away from each other. They wore typical teenage boy clothing, one in skinny jeans and a flannel button up shirt, and the other in baggy clothes.

"Douche bag took my girl!" The one in the baggy clothes yelled, trying to advance on the other one.

"She don't want you! Came runnin' to me, telling me what a jerk you are. Cryin' and all that stupid girlie crap." The other defended himself.

"Listen, boys, I'm a girl. I know what teenage girls are like. You, baggy clothes, you have got to treat her right, or you won't have her anymore. Go apologize, give her a gift. Swallow your pride and tell her how much you care about her. You, skinny jeans, bro-code, ever heard of it? You don't take some other guys girl no matter how much you may want her. He has her, go get a different girl and get over it. I'm sure there's someone just as good out there waiting for you to ask her out." Empress ordered. She looked around and found a tough looking kid and pulled him over. "You both their friend?" He nodded. "You make sure they do as I say, or else." She told him and he nodded.

"I will, miss hot lady." She rolled her eyes. What was school teaching them?

"Stay in school!" She called out as she made her way across the street to the small child she'd heard crying. She had the resources to find out where the kid was and made her way over to him. She bent down in front of the child who was sobbing with his head on his knees and his arms over his eyes. It reminded her of the day she found Sophie, and he couldn't be much older than her, and she couldn't help but feel terrible that he was just sitting out here alone. "Sweetie, are you okay?" She knew it was a stupid question but, she didn't know what else to ask.

"No I l-lost my mommy and daddy." He said in a small, meek voice.

"Okay, what's your name? Do you know where you live?"

"Henry, I l-live by t-the library." He managed to answer, looking up at Empress.

"Could you point out your house if I took you there?" He nodded his head, Empress knew exactly where the neighborhood was, right behind the library there was a small neighborhood where middle class families who worked, usually, business in the city. Empress looked around, they weren't far from the library, she could walk. She wasn't going to take the motorcycle, not with a kid. She contacted Batman to tell him they were going there before she picked him up and started carrying him out of the alley and toward the library.

It was only about four blocks from the alley to the library, and as soon as she got to the neighborhood, the little boy pointed her straight to a little court with medium sized houses, most were ranch houses, mostly for starter homes or families with a couple of kids.

Amelia approached the small, tan ranch house, with the one car garage and small backyard with the play set, and knocked on the large oak door. She saw someone peek out of the bay window curtains and abruptly open the door where a hysterical looking woman ran out to greet the vigilante with her child.

"Thank God, Henry you're okay!" She woman bellowed, Empress handed him over. "I'm so sorry! We were just out for a walk with the dog this afternoon, and I let Henry out of my sight for a minute and he was gone! I thought I lost you, don't you ever run away like that!" She went from sobbing, to explaining to Empress, and then to scolding her child. Empress could relate, she didn't know what she'd do if Sophie ever went missing. Regina had lost her sister once in a mall, and while she wasn't related, it felt like she was and she could remember the pure panic of the mere half an hour that they had lost Noelle.

"It's really okay, just try to be more careful next time. Maybe have your husband come along next time." Empress said, acknowledging the man who had come out of the long hallway straight into the house, telling the person he was on the phone with 'never mind' before hanging it up.

"How can we ever thank you?" He asked, shaking her gloved hand.

"Just be careful. I'm only doing my job." She suggested, before turning and leaving to go back to meet Batman.

~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~

The drug deal had been easy for Batman to infiltrate. The guys weren't very smart, and obviously not used to working as a team to take out their opponents. They were both unconscious in two minutes flat and the police had already been informed. Now he was back where the tumbler and Empress' motorcycle were parked, waiting for her to get back.

He saw her approaching him, and almost scolded her for walking around by herself late at night before he had to remind himself, this was Empress. Not Amelia, she could hold her own. Both of the alter egos could, but it was his job as the fiancee to make sure she didn't.

"How was the drug bust?" Empress asked, mounting her motorcycle.

"Fine. I gotta say though, crime has been pretty boring over the past couple months. _Since Firefly and Ryan. _He added silently, but Empress seemed to read his thoughts and her eyes broke contact. He instantly regretted saying anything. "Can't say I'm complaining though." He quickly added to reassure her that he didn't miss not having to worry about whether she was going to be killed by her psycho ex anymore.

"Yes well, I have...'Vigilantress-y' stuff to do. Catch ya 'round B-man." She saluted him before powering up the motorcycle and rushing off.

"'B-man'...?" He asked himself, climbing into the tumbler. "I don't want a partner that calls me stuff like that."

~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~

As Amelia laid in her bed by herself -for the first time in a while, really- She thought on how awkward it was with her interactions with Batman. As Bruce, she could be flirty, and cuddly but as Empress, she had to act professionally and stifle most of the things she would say to him normally.

She hadn't really had an awkward with Bruce since, well, since Ryan came to get the divorce papers and he told Bruce about Amelia having a baby. But awkward moments with Batman were, frequent -being the best terminology.

The next day, she had to put all of her vigilantress troubles, and focus on Amelia troubles. Planning a wedding was much harder than Amelia thought. In the two weeks since she'd gotten engaged, she looked through hundreds of bridal magazines, searched thousands of online stores for cakes and dresses, even asked questions she wasn't so sure about.

Really, the only things she was certain about was her bridal shower, who was going to walk her down the aisle -Alfred had agreed to it-, what her bouquet was going to be -more pretty baby blue colored hydrangeas-, and who she was going to be marrying. She still had to consult Bruce on what food, what kind of cake, who to invite, what kind of invitations to send, whether to get married at the manor or at a church, where to have the reception, music, what colors they should have, where to go one their honeymoon, and millions of other things popped into Amelia's head as she wrote them down while eating her breakfast. Regina was doing great as their planner; considering the only thing she had to do was figure out where to get the flowers from.

It was mid-summer, being the second week in July, but with the weather in Gotham, you'd have thought it was well in the middle of summer. Amelia had to change out of many of her suit jackets and switch over to silky blouses, or thin -but opaque- cardigans with thin camisoles underneath, which left her feeling exposed and uncomfortable. The only one who didn't have complaints was Bruce. That man could withstand any temperature and still look great in his Armani three piece suits. It amazed Amelia how he could go through a whole work day and almost never ever break a sweat. You knew it was blistering hot when he shed his suit jacket.

"Let's have a fall wedding in the cathedral in town." Bruce suggested. Amelia had been eying the great stone cathedral about a mile down from Wayne Enterprises every time she came to talk about wedding stuff over lunch. "Say, October seventeenth."

"That's a week before our birthday week." Amelia said, looking up from her salad and bridal magazine. She hadn't turned into a bridezilla yet, which was good fro Bruce. He heard women could be very picky when planning a wedding.

"Exactly. We'll go on our honeymoon, and come back and celebrate our birthdays." Bruce said, taking her hand from across the table at the food court in Wayne Enterprises.

"I don't want a big party. If these trust fund people are going to be at our wedding, I won't want them celebrating our birthdays with us too." Bruce nodded. 'Our Wedding' Bruce liked how Amelia never referred to anything as hers. He'd also heard things like brides thought that the wedding was all theirs. _Their _special day, and no one -not even the men that were marrying them- were going to stomp on their dreams. Amelia had told him a few days ago over lunch that she never planned her wedding.

_"When I was seventeen, I told myself that I was never going to marry. I was going to take over the company and never need a man to help me, and maybe even adopt a kid here or there to ease the emptiness of my vast mansion.. And I still want that. I still want control over my own business. And I would still like to adopt or have another child." _

She had been completely kidding about the mansion -well, not really anymore- but it was also her subtle hint to Bruce that there would be no talk of joining the two companies, and that she wanted to adopt another child -as well as have her own she added later. And that had settled the issue of children. Bruce was willing to go along with anything that made her happy, he realized. Earlier on in his life he may have had a problem with a woman who wanted to adopt kids and have a few of her own but now, the idea didn't even bother him. Perhaps because the women he dated mentioned this on the first date, instead of _after _he'd engaged and planned on a future with them. Not that he _had _proposed to any other woman.

Amelia had been rambling about anything and everything concerning the wedding, and while Bruce had no problem with talking about it -he actually quite enjoyed it- he knew that she felt she had to clarify any little thing with him over it.

"Amelia," He squeezed her hand to get her attention. "I don't mind anything about the wedding, as long as you're there, ready to marry me." He said in a way that wouldn't make her think that he didn't care about the wedding, just that he didn't care what things looked like, as long as she still wanted to marry him by the time the date came.

"Always." She said, leaning forward to kiss him sweetly on the lips.

**A/N: Bleh. I'm not too excited about the first half of this chapter and I almost rewrote the whole thing but, it's important to the future. That is, if I decide not to be a space case and remember where I'm going with this plot. hahaha**

**This was pretty much a filler chapter that I worked on weeks ago when I had no ideas. Oh well.**

**Good? Bad? Lemme know!  
**


	20. Chapter 20

**Chapter 20**

The next few days progressed slowly, but Amelia had been sure to be enthusiastic for Regina when David came to pick her up for their date. Amelia had given her a beautiful little midnight blue cocktail dress that had been a size too small for Amelia when the designer sent it to her, perfect for Regina's size. _Regina has always been the twig. _

When Regina emerged from the bathroom, Amelia could tell she felt beautiful. The dress had fit Regina's tall and skinny body perfectly, the blue flower on the left hip had added a nice accent that Regina couldn't stop touching.

"I just like the silk!" She exclaimed as Amelia pried her hand away from it, laughing

"You're so juvenile. Come on, your man's waiting." Amelia pulled her from the bedroom and all but pushed her down the stairs.

"I really feel good about this guy, Amelia." Regina looked at her friend, with the hopeful look in her eyes, that Amelia hadn't recognized in her friend's face after all these years, even with Greg.

"That's when you know it's right." She answered, pushing her off on David before telling them to be good kids and to have Regina back by midnight. "They grow up so fast." She said to Bruce as he walked up the driveway with a stack of movies.

"Movie night? I brought a few for Sophie while she's still up." He kissed Amelia on the temple when he reached her. "Since Regina's not here, I thought we'd take the night off."

"Sounds good. I'm just about to make dinner."

~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~

"Bruce," Amelia called Bruce a few days later. "I'm sick. Can you come get Sophie?"

"I'll be right over." Bruce said, shutting his phone and grabbing a ring of car keys. It was just past seven and Bruce had just finished dinner when Amelia called.

A half an hour later, the billionaire stepped onto his fiance's doorstep. He knocked on the door, and it revealed a very disheveled, very pale Amelia. She was holding a tissue to her nose, and she was still in her capri sweatpants and a black tank top.

"Hi." Was all she said, her voice was nasally and Bruce was sure she didn't want to speak like that. "I need you to take Sophie to the Manor. I know I should be exposing her to all this but, I think it's a sinus infection and I'd rather not deal with a cranky, stuffy toddler, especially since we're meeting teachers at the preschool in around a week."

"That's fine. Is she ready?" He asked, trying to kiss her forehead, but Amelia dodged it mentioning that he couldn't afford to be sick.

"Regina's packing her a bag full of clothes for a week." She said before sneezing for the upteenth time that day.

"Let's get on the road, Bruce-y boy." Sophie swaggered down the stairway, with her princess backpack, pink leather jacket, and light blue sunglasses perched on her nose. "You wouldn't mind gettin' my bag will ya', big guy?" She smiled sweetly up at him.

"Sophie Elanor Bennet." Amelia warned, Sophie looked down and apologized.

"Sure, I'll get your bag. Go on out to the car and climb into your booster seat." Bruce complied, stifling a laugh and barely hiding his smile.

"Don't be afraid to punish her if she acts like that. It's all the paparazzi can do if they say she's allowed to act like that because of her guardians." Amelia told him as he walked out the door.

"Don't worry, Amelia. We'll be fine. I love you."

"I love you too." She answered, waving them off as they drove down the street towards the Palisades.

"Bruce-y?" Sophie asked as Bruce tucked her into bed after reading a story. "Are you gonna be my dad?" Bruce sighed. How do you explain something like this to a six year old?

"Legally, yes. But-" He started, nervously. _This is harder than I thought. _

"Can I call you daddy, then?" Sophie asked, innocently. She had already adopted the term 'mommy' for Amelia.

"Sure, sweetheart." He answered with a smile. He finished tucking her in, and kissed her forehead. As he headed over to the door, Sophie's little voice called out to him.

"I love you daddy." Bruce paused at the doorway to look back at her little, tired face.

"I love you too, Sophie." He said as he flipped off the light.

"Alfred. She asked me if she could call me 'dad'. If you had told me a year ago that I'd be a father, I would laughed in your face, and told you to lay off the cocktails." Bruce confided in his trusty butler after checking on Sophie for the millionth time that evening.

"Is that a problem? I thought all future surrogate fathers wanted their children to call them 'dad'." Alfred looked up from the paper to see Bruce pacing the floor.

"It's just, astounding that a girl her age has already grasped the fact that she doesn't have a dad, other than me. It's heartbreaking to know someone would leave someone like her by herself. I don't know, maybe I'm looking too far into this."

"Master Bruce, you're just nervous about having the responsibility of being a father. When you get married, you'll be almost fully responsible for Sophie, and possibly more of your own children. Think of this as a test, for when your future comes. I'm sure you'll be a fine father." Alfred said confidently. He had certainly been a little overwhelmed for the responsibility of Bruce after his parents passed. "Now, can I get you anything else?" When Bruce shook his head no, still lost in the inner workings of his mind, Alfred folded the paper and stood up from the great arm chair. "Well, then, if you're not going out tonight, I think I'll retire a little early. I'm not as young as I used to be."

"Just be careful Alfred, someday you'll have little ones running around here calling you 'Grandpa'." Bruce mentioned, taking a seat on the couch.

"I don't think I'll ever be ready for that day, Master Wayne." He mentioned with a small smile and a shake of his head, before leaving the room.

~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~

"Morning, tidbit." Bruce greeted a sleepy Sophie, who was still rubbing the sleep out of her eyes, escorted in by Alfred carrying a tray of breakfast foods.

"Hi, dad." She answered before a large yawn escaped her little mouth. She happily climbed into the bed next to Bruce and burrowed into the thick, black duvet.

"I have cocoa puffs and chocolate milk for young Sophie, here. And an omelet and protein shake for you, master Bruce.

"Thank you, Alfred. How did you sleep, Sophie?" Bruce asked, looking at the small lump under his covers. She groaned sleepily in reply. "I'm going to visit Amelia before I go to work, and then you can come with me okay? But I want you to stay in the car while I go in, okay? Mia doesn't want you getting sick."

"Amelia?" Bruce called out as he entered her house. He saw Regina in the kitchen and asked if she'd go out and sit with Sophie. He heard a groan coming from her bedroom, and he hastily made his way up the stairs with the flowers and soup, Alfred had made for her, and entered her bedroom. She was laying on her bed, sideways, and her head was hanging off the side. "How do you feel?"

"Like crap." She muttered. "Have you thought of a place to have the honeymoon?" She perked up a little, she had assigned Bruce

"As a matter of fact, yes. I was thinking we'd take the yacht out for a week or so, and sail around out by the Caribbean? We can leave Sophie with Regina or Alfred."

"Sounds good. Now go get to work, mister Wayne. You're going to be late." She ordered with a small smile.

"Alright, alright. I'll see you later. I love you." He got up and kissed her forehead before leaving the room.

~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~

"Good afternoon, Bruce. And who is this little one?" Bruce's newest secretary, Hannah, -the other one got a little...too distracted.- greeted Bruce as she bent down to greet little Sophie, holding Bruce's hand, trailing behind him a little bit. Hannah was nice, she was married and had a few kids of her own; partly why Bruce hired her, so she'd actually get work done.

"This is my fiance's little girl, Sophie." Bruce told her. "Are there any message for me?" When she shook her head no, he told her 'Thank you' and headed into his office.

"Bruce?" Hannah knocked on his door. Bruce looked up from his paperwork and saw her brunette-haired head sticking out behind the large oak door. "Mr. Fox is on line one, and I was wondering if you'd like me to take Sophie down to the daycare. Miles is down there with a few other kids, and I'm sure they wouldn't mind meeting a new friend?" She looked over to Sophie, who was looking at Bruce, who was contemplating. Miles was Hannah's son, and he was sure a few other secretaries had their kids there. He started a trend through the office, suggesting everyone hire either an engaged or married secretary, so Bruce could actually get work done with. So, naturally they had to put a daycare center beside the food court in the back corner of the lobby. "Alright, you can go. But play nice, and tell an adult if someone is mean to you." Sophie jumped up and gathered her coloring things, and her dinosaur Leonard, and stuffed them into her Tigger backpack before running over to take Hannah's hand.

"So, are you excited to have Bruce as your daddy?" Hannah asked as they rode down the elevator.

"Yeah, he's a real nice kid." She answered with a completely straight face. Hannah couldn't help but laugh silently next to her.

"So, what do you like to watch on TV?" She asked, they still had fifteen more floors to go down.

"The Backyardigans is my favorite. I don't like the other ones." She made a face of disgust at the mention of other shows on TV. "But I like Mickey Mouse Clubhouse too."

The afternoon progressed slowly, as did a few days, and Sophie continued to stay in the Manor as Amelia started to feel better, and she continued to go to Wayne Enterprises during the day. Alfred was also happier than he let on at the prospect of having another little one running around the house, and potentially more in the future.

It was now a Friday, and Bruce was in a meeting near the end of the day, and he had just sent Sophie back to the daycare after getting her some dinner in the food court. The meeting was with big business men, about a merger, and was progressing slowly when Jessica's, Mr. Fox's assistant, frantic -normally calm- voice came over the intercom;

"Mister Wayne? There's a problem in the daycare. They need you down there A.S.A.P." As Bruce stood up from his place and rushed over to the elevator right outside of the office, he was worried, and wondered what was going on down there. When he got down to the Daycare, the head caretaker was sobbing and rocking back and forth in her chair, and parents were filing in to pick up their kids.

"What happened?" He asked, calmly.

"I'm so sorry!"

"It's okay, Lauren. Just tell me what happened?" He asked calmly, it may have just been his fatherly instinct but he couldn't help but feel like something happened to Sophie.

"I was taking another little one to the bathroom and when I got back, she wasn't there. I'm so sorry! I should have had someone else in here with me! I'll pay for her hospital bills when you find her, I'll do anything!" She sobbed out. She was on the verge of being hysterical. Lauren was a mother of three herself, so she knew what Bruce must have been going through.

"It's fine, Lauren. We'll find her." On the exterior, Bruce was calm, it would have only been worse if he lost his calm. But on the inside, Bruce was freaking out. It was the worst feeling on earth knowing that his future child was missing. "Okay, I need someone to take her home, please. She doesn't need to be getting in a crash. I'm going to call Amelia, and while I'm doing that, I need someone getting security tapes, of the lobby, daycare center, and parking lot. I need to know what this guy looks like or what car he drives." Bruce felt his inner Batman coming out, taking action to find Sophie. Letting the people that he works with know how he really is; a responsible adult who knows how to handle a stressful situation.

Everyone was quick to disperse as Bruce walked over to the telephone right outside the door.

"Hello?" Amelia answered apprehensively. Bruce has a different number than Wayne Enterprises, as a private line, so he doesn't usually call from the business line. Motherly instincts told her that couldn't be good.

"Amelia. You're going to freak out, but please remain calm." Bruce pinched the bridge of his nose, dreading telling her.

"Bruce, what is it?" She asked as she started to pace the floor. Now she was really worried.

"Sophie, was...Taken from the daycare center today." He muttered out. Amelia felt herself go numb before she barely felt the phone slip from her fingers. She doesn't remember anything from that point, including racing down to Wayne Enterprises, and sobbing into Bruce's expensive suit, collapsing into his arms when she arrived. "The security team are reviewing the tapes right now."

"I don't know what to do, Bruce. I don't know whether to go out as Empress and beat it out of whoever would do this, or whether to go out as a worried mother and get my daughter and walk away as if nothing happened." She confided in Bruce in the privacy of his office.

"Right now, all we can do, is wait." He said plopping down in his chair heavily.

"Mister Wayne? We found who took Sophie." A timid voice that he recognized as the new front desk woman came over his intercom.

"This is it." He said, taking Amelia's hand.

**A/N: Oooh, a dramatic turn.**

**Haha I wrote this while I, myself, was sick, confined to my couch for six whole days with a mind splitting headache. **

**I think the idea of a dad calling their daughter tidbit is one of the cutest things ever! Haha.**

**Good? Bad? Lemme know!  
**


	21. Chapter 21

**Chapter 21**

"Why haven't we called the police yet? I didn't even think to do it." Amelia started panicking when they were on their way down to the security room.

"We can't file a missing persons report until forty-eight hours have passed." He told her calmly.

"But Gordon-"

"Gordon can't do anything more than any other police man, there's protocol. We can, however, try and find her ourselves." He quickly cut in.

"Whoever hacked the system was good but, we had backup cameras that they obviously didn't take into account." The security guard informed them when they entered the back room. "We know for sure it was a man, by his size and physique. He looked around middle aged, but he had a black cap on and kept his body turned away from the cameras at all times. We zoomed in on the footage of him approaching Sophie, and she seemed to remain calm so, he probably lied about being a friend of the family."

"What about his mode of transportation? Did he drive a car?" Bruce asked the man, working hard to keep his voice level, his jaw hurt from being clenched so tight he thought it would just snap.

"He took a charter bus out going toward the Narrows; 42nd street. License plate number 'J-D-R-S-4-7-1' He looked like the only one on minus the driver, but we had a limited view from the street. I sent out a red flag to the people who monitor the stop light cameras to look out for the bus." The security guard informed them, not making eye contact.

"I'm going after her." Amelia said, taking her keys out of her jeans pocket. Bruce told her no, but just because they were in front of people, so he had to look like a protective fiance.

"One more thing, we found a janitor's outfit in the dumpster out back. So, whoever he is, he's been in the building for at least a week, that was when cleaning staff last hired someone."

"Thank you." Bruce growled. He couldn't believe he could let this happen in his own business. He needed to tighten up security, and monitor every hiring that went on.

"Bruce, let's go. I don't know how long we have." Amelia ground out from clenched teeth.

"Okay, but, cry. We don't want the paparazzi knowing we're going out to look for her." He said, wrapping his arm around her shoulders. Amelia slumped her shoulders and put her head down, letting more tears fall from her eyes. When they exited the building, paparazzi were hovering outside the door to the parking lot, waiting for the distraught couple. Millions of questions flew their way, but they didn't answer any of them. Bruce just glared at all the cameras and Amelia kept her head down, making it obvious that she was crying. She waited until they were safely out of the parking garage and away from the paparazzi to put her head up, wiping away the moisture. She balled her hands into fists and put her head down once again, the anger taking back over. Bruce took one of her hands, after flipping on the radio.

'It seems our former playboy, Bruce Wayne, has finally given up the recklessness and embraced parenthood. We've been informed a couple minutes ago that Bruce's Fiance, Amelia's, adopted daughter, Sophie, was stolen from Wayne Enterprises daycare this very afternoon. The couple coming out of Wayne Tower looked, distraught to say the least. Bruce had on the face of a parent who's just been told their child had gone missing and Amelia was in tears. They refused to answer any questions, and left the parking lot in silence. Watch Gotham City News at ten on channel three-oh-five for more det-'

Bruce abruptly shut off the radio after the newscast. They had not left Wayne Tower five minutes ago and they were already shelling out reports. And of course he'd looked like his child just went missing, she had! As far as Bruce was concerned, Sophie was his child.

"Bruce, when we have kids of our own, the paparazzi are never getting sight of them. This can't happen again." Amelia muttered after a long silence.

"Agreed." Was all he said. He was afraid of taking his anger out on her to say anything more.

~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~

"So, you're a friend of my mommy's?" Sophie asked, swinging her legs back and forth as she munched on chicken nuggets. She didn't know who this man was, but he said he knew Bruce-y and he gave her chicken nuggets.

"Yup. I've known your mommy for a while." The man said. His voice was deep and he had steel blue eyes, and close cropped brown hair.

"Is mommy coming here to get me?" She looked him in the eye. The man was sitting across from her at the table, just looking at her, as if she were about to make a sudden move and he was ready to pounce.

"We'll see." He answered shortly. He couldn't stand the thought of Amelia having children. _She's mine. She couldn't have had kids. _

~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~

When Bruce and Amelia arrived at the bus depot in the narrows, they found the bus they were looking for refueling. They found the short, tubby, bus driver at the vending machine getting a bag of chips.

"Remember Bruce, this man may not know what's going on. Try and be calm." Amelia advised as they approached the man. Bruce leaned casually against the vending machine until the man noticed him and looked over at him.

"You dropped off a man and a little girl a little while ago. Where did you take them?" He asked as calmly as he could. The man looked to the left of him nervously.

"I don't know what you're talking about. Ain't no one been on my bus." He said nervously.

"Tell me where you took them." He said through clenched teeth.

"Look, buddy, that's none of your business." He said, picking up his bag of chips out of the machine. Bruce slammed his hand against the machine so hard the man thought it would break.

"It is my business! The man stole my child from my work place, and God only knows what he's doing to her right now." He yelled threateningly.

"Alright. He paid me to take him to Lane Avenue house number two-forty-three. Just, don't hurt me. I didn't know what he was going to do. He said it was his niece." He plead to Bruce pathetically.

Bruce growled and stomped back to his car, taking Amelia with him. He jammed his key into the ignition and the car roared to life. As they made their way over to Lane Avenue at top speed, Amelia was stressing herself out by expecting the worst. Who could have stolen Sophie, and why?

The house was rather easy to locate, it was the last one on the block, and by far the biggest. It also had been abandoned from the look of the weather beaten siding and shutters. Some of the second floor windows had holes in them, and it looked like there was a gap in the roof.

"I'm going in." He said cutting off the engine a few houses down.

"I'm going with you." Bruce had been about to protest when Amelia cut him off, "Sophie is my daughter, my responsibility. Besides, who knows who kidnapped her. We'll both be needed in there."

"Fine, but you get Sophie out of there, and you leave. I'll handle this." She nodded as they made their way over to the house. Amelia looked around the property nervously, expecting someone to pop out and attack at any moment. The air was tense, and they were both poised for attack.

"Crap. I know who took her." She whispered, looking into the house. She could see Sophie sitting at the table with a jug of chocolate milk, and a man sitting across from her through the back window. "That man in there was my neighbor, back in California, when I was sixteen, we had to take a restraining order against him because he was popping up everywhere I went. We found out later that he had been stalking me for a while. He was twenty-one when I was sixteen, and it went on for about two years, until he just moved away. Now he's in there with my child, which means he's probably been watching me for a while. Long enough to know I've adopted. That means he knows who you are too. What have I done?" She started panicking, this man was not right. He had buggy eyes, and unwashed, dirty blond hair.

"You didn't do anything wrong. Look, I'm going to go in there, and confront him. This window is unlocked. You sneak in while he's distracted, take Sophie, and run."

"No, I need to be there. I don't know what he's capable of, and two heads are better than one. I'm gonna take Sophie to one of these houses, and come back. Please, don't do anything stupid, or painful, until I get back."

"Okay. Wait until he leaves the dining room then come in. Open the window so you're ready." She nodded and started lifting up the window as Bruce made his way back around to the front. She heard the door open and slam close, and she saw Rick, was his name, get up and go to the front room.

"Sophie!" Amelia whispered loudly. "Sophie! Hey!" She finally got her attention, and Amelia signaled for Sophie to be silent. She motioned her to tip-toe over to the window, which she did, and Amelia grabbed Sophie and ran her over to the nearest house, which was housing an elderly couple. "Please, I have to go back and help my fiance, can you watch my daughter? I can pay you anything!" She plead with the elderly woman.

"Nonsense, dear, you're Amelia Bennet, hand her over, we'll watch her until we get back." Amelia looked skeptical until she saw the news playing in the background and figured they saw her story on the news. She handed Sophie over, told her to be good, and ran back next door.

When she got back, she noticed that they were simply circling each other silently, waiting for an opportunity.

"Rick, what are you doing here?" Amelia yelled from the doorway, marching over to him and smacking him on the face.

"I just had to see your beautiful face again, so we can live out our future like you promised we would." He said, pathetically.

"What are you talking about?" She hollered.

"You promised that once you grew up, you would come find me and we'd live together. It seems you've forgotten our promise to each other, and moved on." He looked over to Bruce and glared daggers.

"Of course I moved on, I never made that promise! That was almost fourteen years ago."

"Well we can still be together." He said, grasping her hand in his. He felt her ring and ripped it off her finger, tossing it to Bruce. She sighed heavily and did anything she could to distract him, so, she kissed him. His lips were dry and cracked, and the kiss was very forceful, and not in a good way. During the kiss, Amelia waved Bruce over to knock him out or something. Bruce finally got the hint when he looked up from clenching his fists, and moved behind 'Rick' and punched his right temple.

"I was wondering if you'd ever do that." She groaned, wiping her lips, trying to cleanse them somehow. "I was going too, but I thought I'd give you the satisfaction."

~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~

"Well, we pumped her stomach and took a blood sample, and looks like the only thing he gave her was chicken and chocolate milk. Nothing out of the ordinary. Everything is in check, not one hair misplaced on her head." The doctor informed them cheerily.

"Thank you, doctor." Amelia smiled, he nodded and walked away. "You ready to go, munchkin?" Sophie nodded her head, and got down from the bed. She looked at Bruce talking to the Commissioner and told him they'd be waiting in the car.

"He's conscious, and in a holding cell. We put out a new restraining order. He's being shipped back off to California into their jurisdiction." Gordon informed the young billionaire.

"Thank you, Gordon. It means a lot." Bruce said, genuinely.

"No problem, just try to be more careful." Bruce nodded, shook his hand, and signed Sophie out before heading over to the door and headed home.

"So, that guy wasn't a friend of the family?" Sophie asked innocently.

"No, Tidbit. And next time someone comes up to you and says so, you come and get either me or Amelia, or the adult that's watching you. Don't talk to strangers." Bruce told her, he saw her nod from the back seat. Bruce took Amelia's hand and kissed it. "Any other psychotic stalkers I need to know about?"

"No, I'm pretty sure that's the last one." She said with a smile. "Now, let's go home, and pretend this never happened."

"Agreed." Bruce replied.

**A/N: Well, there you have it. This was kind of a last minute plot line, as somewhat of a filler and I had to rewrite the last half so, I ope it didn't suck too much.**

**Good? Bad? Lemme know!  
**


	22. Chapter 22

**Chapter 22**

The next few months were rather normal, Summer faded, Autumn took over, Sophie went off to school, and the building of Safe Haven started and was progressing nicely. Wedding plans were also coming along nicely, Regina was doing a great job. Sophie was practicing non-stop for her role as flower girl all the time now, up and down the hallways of the manor. Before Amelia knew it, she had a week left until her wedding, and she was going in for a final fitting of her dress, and confirming every little detail involved with the wedding. Her mother was staying in the manor with her most recent husband and their seven year old little boy.

"Sophie, Christophe, your chicken nuggets are ready." Alfred called the two children who had been watching an animated super hero show, ran into the kitchen and sat at the bar stools and started to feast on their chicken.

"Amelia Peyton Bennet, soon-to-be-Wayne!" Regina yelled at her friend as soon as she entered her old house, as of now, Amelia's been living at the Wayne Manor. Amelia recognized Regina's yelling voice, something happened, and it wasn't good.

"Yes?" She drew out her answer innocently, as if that would lighten the blow.

"Care to explain _why _the paparazzi have a picture of your alter ego and Batman locking lips?" Regina hollered from the top of the stairs. Amelia visibly winced. _Crap. Forgot about that. _That day, she had not seen Bruce and he had stressful meetings all day and he lost a major deal with a company when they found out about what happened to Sophie this few months ago, and he was angry when he met Amelia, and she distracted him by telling him that he'd get to beat up some bad guys, cuddle with his fiancee, play with his, almost, daughter in the morning, and she had kissed him. She knew it was reckless but she just wound her arms around his neck and kissed him. It worked, it put Bruce in a better mood. Unfortunately, paparazzi thought the pair was getting comfortable and decided to try to follow them around. Obviously it had worked.

"Well, uh, I-" She sputtered a few times until her phone interrupted the soon-to-be-awkward conversation. _Thank God. _"Bruce, hi. Uhm, before you start we have a little problem." She started walking away from Regina into the living room.

"Don't you think this conversation is over, young lady!"

"What's the problem, and why is Regina yelling?" Bruce asked, getting a little worried. They didn't need a falling out a week before the wedding.

"Well, the paparazzi may or may not have gotten a picture of Empress and Batman kissing, and Regina may or may not have seen it. So, now she thinks I'm cheating on you."

"I'll be over soon, just, stall." He said, hanging up his phone abruptly.

"Regina, Bruce is coming over to help straighten this out."

"What does Bruce have to do with this, other than the fact that you're compromising your relationship with him."

"Just trust me." It took Bruce ten minutes to get to Amelia's house, and she guessed he was coming from Wayne Tower. "Okay so, either you have to tell her or I have to make up a freakin' good excuse for why I'm making out with Batman." She whispered to his as she walked him up the drive.

"I'll just tell her, we can obviously trust her since she's kept your secret so long."

"Okay just, go before she blows."

"Hi, Regina." Bruce sat down across from her on the couch.

"Bruce." She was still mad. How could her best friend do this to him?

"Listen, we need to talk. Before you say anything, I need to say what I'm about to tell you is a matter of life and...Prison." Regina looked at him for the first time, and nodded. "I am the Batman." Regina grinned and then started cracking up.

"Bruce, really you don't have to lie-"

"I am the Batman." He repeated in his Batman voice.

"Anyone could put that voice on." She hesitated, her defenses failing.

"Look, I'll show you my suit or something sometime soon, you just have to trust me." He said. She finally nodded and called Amelia in. She sat next to Bruce where he took her hands and kissed them.

"I'm sorry Amelia. I should have trusted you."

"You're fine. I would have done the same thing. No big deal. Now, Bruce. You called for?"

"Um, yes. I have someone to show you." He said suspiciously, walking out to his car before Amelia could respond. He walked back in a few minutes later and waited for Amelia to turn back around before stepping aside to reveal the girl Amelia saw at the police station a few months back, right after the Ryan/Firefly tussle. She was a young girl, almost fourteen years old, she was petite, like her mother, and she was close to tears.

"Mommy?" She whimpered before crashing into Amelia arms, the wetness rolling down her cheeks. Amelia looked at Bruce, with a shocked expression and he just nodded.

"It's Sara, right?" Amelia asked, putting her arms around her long-lost daughter's shoulders. She felt her nod. "What are you doing here?"

"I got put in a foster home in Pennsylvania, and when Ryan and Firefly came to find me, he told me he was my father and you were my mother. The Gotham police made me do community service, since my dad and Firefly forced me to work with them, and then I heard you were getting married and I told my surrogate family that I had to come find you. Only for a few days." She explained weakly.

"So you're just here for the wedding, and then you'll go back to your family, right?" She nodded. "Okay, good. I just don't want you to be thrown into the chaos of my life more than you already have when you have such a seemingly comfortable life back home."

"I just needed to know, if anything ever happens, I have a real mom out there and she isn't messed up."

"Of course, I'm here for you if you need anything, and so is Bruce."

"Well, there is one more thing." Sara answered meekly, Amelia looked to Bruce and he just gave her a sheepish smile. "I found this great dane right before the whole Firefly thing, and my mom's allergic to dogs so she's making me get rid of it. I just can't do that to the cute little guy."

"Bruce? What do you think of it?" Amelia looked at Bruce, playing the neutral card.

"It can stay at the Manor, I suppose. We've got a big enough yard for it." He shrugged and nodded.

"_He,_" Sara corrected "and his name is Cowboy."

"I have to go get Sara fitted for a new bridesmaid's dress, and you, mister, have to find one more groomsmen. I can't just not have my daughter in my wedding." Amelia told Bruce as they both walked out of the house.

"I don't really have anyone close to ask, Amelia." Bruce told her, opening her car door for her.

"Then, I'll ask my cousin, Phil. It'll all work out, don't worry." She said, giving him a quick peck before climbing into the car and speeding off.

~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~

"Oh, Sara, you look so beautiful!" The strapless semi-scoop neck with ruching at the top dress, draped over Sara's developing body perfectly. It was a sea foam green with a chocolate brown sash right under the empire-waist bust. The rest of the skirt was down to about her knees, giving her a youthful look, and the skirt was pleated with small, neat pleats all the way around.

"Thank you uh -"

"You can call me mom or Amelia."

"Thanks mom. I'm glad I could be a part of your wedding. Are you guys doing a bachelor and bachelorette party?"

"No, Bruce and I both decided it would be better for both of us to not participate in something that could so easily destroy a relationship. A.K.A. I don't want what happened in _The Hangover _to happen to Bruce." Amelia said with a laugh.

"That makes sense, I guess."

"Yes, now go get changed because you're going to meet the other two bridesmaid's at lunch today."

"So this is your long-lost daughter? She looks exactly like you!" Kara gushed at lunch at a small bistro in the middle of downtown Gotham. Sara was busy looking out the window in amazement at all the buildings and people surrounding her.

"I've never been outside of Pennsylvania before, it's all so much."

"Gotham is a lot to handle, but you get used to it." Violet told Sara, from beside her seat. Violet sat next to Sara, Amelia sat next to Kara across from the two, and Regina sat at the end.

"I called Phil, and so I'm switching the line-up and Violet will be escorted by Phil. Is that okay?"

"Do your thing, girl. It's your wedding." Violet told her, laughing.

"So, are you nervous yet?" Regina asked Amelia.

"I mean, when I get time to just sit down and think about it I always think about if I'm ready to do this again, and if we're moving too fast, but then I think about what I was before I met Bruce. I was a bitter work-a-holic who was destined to be forever alone, in love with her job until the day she died, and a cat lady. Many people may not think so, but we've been through a lot more than a normal couple in the eight months we've been together. I think we're ready for it, and once it's done, it's done." Regina just modded and smiled encouragingly.

"So Sara, what do you like to do for fun?" Violet asked the young girl.

"I like to go to the mall, swimming, riding my bike, playing sports, my parents introduced me to a nice youth group where me and my friends hang out all the time. Normal teenager stuff."

'Sounds like us, Amelia." Regina joked.

"Well, we better get going soon, I have to go check on Sophie and confirm more wedding details, It'll never end I swear. All these people act as if it's the prince of England getting married."

"As far as they're concerned, you are." Regina joked.

"Yes, it's their heir of Gotham, the infamous Playboy finally settling down to marry another young heiress. Oh, and another shocker, the companies _aren't _merging to form a new super alliance of major companies!" Regina joked sarcastically.

"I'm sure things will calm down once you guys get officially married." Kara said.

**A/N: Soooo, this was basically a filler chapter. I'm really lagging with writing lately...**

**The wedding is next and after that there are only a couple more chapters. Possibly including an epilogue.**

**Good? Bad? Lemme know!**


	23. Chapter 23

**Chapter 23 **

Amelia opened her eyes slowly, wishing the sun would go away just until she woke up a little, until she remembered what day it was. Shooting up in bed, she checked the time. Nine a.m.

"I'm getting married in four hours." She scrambled out of bed, momentarily forgetting that she was in her own home, forgetting that her and Bruce decided not to see each other all day of their wedding until the actual wedding.

"Good morning, sunshine. It's about dang time you're up!" Regina said cheerily, carrying in a tray of food.

"Regina, unless you want your pajamas splattered with yesterday's dinner, I suggest you don't try and feed me." Amelia warned, her nerves were setting in just a little.

"Well, if you're not going to eat, we better get going. Your mom's over at the church with Bruce, they're already setting things up." Amelia nodded and headed over to the bathroom to take a quick shower.

"So, I picked up your dress this morning." Regina mentioned when Amelia emerged, dressed now in sweat pants and a tank top instead of her nightgown.

"Yeah," Amelia waited.

"It just as beautiful as it was when I saw it on you. I dropped it off at the church and locked it in your bathroom in your changing room."

"Where's Sophie?"

"Eating breakfast with Christophe. Your mom also dropped off a booster seat for him."

~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~

"Alfred, I am freaking out." A very panicked Bruce uncharacteristically confided in his butler, who was helping him tie his bow tie, considering he couldn't get his hands to stop shaking enough to tie it.

"I don't think I've ever seen you so nervous, master Wayne."

"I guess that's what happens when you get married, Alfred."

"I haven't witnessed such feelings in a long time, sir."

"You were married, Alfred?" Bruce asked, raising his eyebrows.

"Once upon a time. Also had a lovely little girl, both taken from me by a common criminal. Guess that's why I'm so partial to Batman." He turned around, to avoid the shocked stare of Bruce. He didn't want sympathy, it was the past, he moved on. He felt the comforting hand on his shoulder and left to make sure things were being set up properly.

~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~

Amelia had been sitting in a makeup chair, waiting for her hair to curl for almost three hours. She was getting impatient, for her hair to curl, for her makeup to be done, -which was in progress at the moment- and for her wedding to start. Her and Bruce were virtually married, why did they have to have a big ceremony to prove it? _I guess we're only doing this for the media's benefits._

"What's up, Amelia?" Regina asked, sensing her distress.

"I just don't understand why me and Bruce have to do things just for the media. The media didn't hound me so much anywhere else."

"Well you better get used to it, the media practically lives outside of Wayne Manor waiting for Master Bruce's trials and tribulations." Alfred said, walking into the room. "You do look beautiful, my dear."

"Alfred, I don't even have my makeup, hair, or dress on." Amelia said, blushing.

"Then, you will be the most beautiful creature on this earth when you are ready."

"Alfred, I really appreciate you walking me down the aisle."

"It is my greatest honor to do so, Amelia." Alfred called her Amelia for the first time since he met her, and she could tell, right now in this moment, he saw her as daughter, not an employer. She took the opportunity and hugged him, sniffling away her tears.

"Hey, hey! No runny makeup young lady!" Her makeup artist groused. She rolled her eyes and smiled at Alfred, sitting back in her chair.

"Amelia, the ceremony starts in forty-five minutes, and the cake isn't at the manor yet." Regina was freaking out as she entered the bride's chambers. Amelia was up in the west wing of the church, while Bruce was in the east wing getting ready.

Almost an hour later, and Amelia was ready at the door, her bridesmaids in front of her, ready to walk her down the aisle. She wasn't really nervous. No, she's already been though this before but this time she felt secure that it was going to last. Alfred walked up beside her and took her arm as the music started and people's chatter died down.

"It's time." She whispered to herself, taking a deep breath. The doors opened, and out walked Sophie throwing the rose petals, Christophe holding the rings, Violet, Kara, Sara, then Regina. The music changed to the Bridal March, and Alfred started leading Amelia through the back doors. The sanctuary looked amazing. Bouquets of baby blue hydrangeas lined the pews and a white carpet with white rose pedals led the way down to the alter where the priest, Bruce, and all the groomsmen and bridesmaids waited. The sun shone brightly through the stain glass window, casting a magical glow throughout the large room. The organ echoed out the song as Amelia made her way down the line. All eyes were on her. She spotted Commissioner Gordon and his family, Lucius Fox, and Ryan's mother and wife among about one hundred and fifty other guests. She was too busy marveling at the room that she realized that they had arrived at the altar, and Bruce was waiting for her to take his hand, smiling. "You look very dapper." She commented as the priest started.

"And you look more beautiful than ever before."

"The day you asked me to marry you was probably the happiest day of my life. But this day, this is the best day of _our _life."

"So, do you Bruce Wayne take this woman to be your lawfully wedded wife, to have and to hold, for richer or for poorer, in sickness and in health?" The priest asked.

"Of course."

"And do you, Amelia Bennet, take this man to be your lawfully wedded husband, to have an to hold, for richer or for poorer, in sickness and in health?"

"Always."

"Now each will ready their vows."

"Amelia, I promise the word 'divorce' will never be in our vocabulary. I promise to bring you soup when you are sick, to comfort you when you're sad, to love you always, and to stay true all my days."

"Bruce, I promise to stay with you through thick and thin, I promise to help you when you're down, to take away the sadness, to brighten your day, to love you forever, and never break away."

"The bride and groom has asked me to read this while they exchange rings. 'May you never steal, lie, or cheat, but if you must steal, then steal away my sorrows, and if you must lie, lie with me all the nights of my life, and if you must cheat, then please cheat death because I couldn't live a day without you.'" As he finished, he closed his binder, looked at the two, smiled a knowing smile, and announced; "By the power vested in me, I now pronounce you husband and wife. Bruce, you may kiss your bride."

Bruce looked lovingly at Amelia before sweeping her into his arms for their first kiss as a married couple. Once they broke apart, she laughed and they faced the crowd together. Something about their first kiss seemed different than all the others, it signified that they were one now, not just two people brought together by some supernatural force, but one.

"It's my joy and privilege to announce for the first time ever, Mr and Mrs Bruce Wayne." The priest announced proudly as they played exiting music and the bride and groom exited, hand in hand.

~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~

"The ceremony was very beautiful, Bruce!" Mrs. Fox said cheerfully to the happy couple at the reception hall in the large dining hall of Wayne Manor. Everyone was dining and chatting excitedly waiting for all the speeches, cake, and soon enough, the dancing. The wedding party had just finished taking wedding photos on the gardens of Wayne Manor.

"Thank you, Mrs Fox but really you should be telling this to Amelia." Bruce said, looking over at Amelia who was holding a very irate looking Sophie. "I didn't really do much, to be honest."

"I'd like to make a toast," Regina tapped her glass with her knife. "to the bride and groom. Thank you all for coming and joining us here, by the way. I've known Amelia since we were little ones in kinder care together. We hated each other. I thought she was over-privileged and she saw me as that weird one that ate glue in the back of the classroom -which never happened mind you. But over the course of our elementary and middle school journey we got more and more classes together and had to tolerate each other. About eighth grade we became as close as we are now. Through those times We've been through countless break-ups, make-ups, fights, joyful times, sad times, and happy times together. When Amelia's dad passed away I was the first one to hear. I was at their house constantly. What I'm getting at here, is Amelia, you're my best friend, my sister, and I only wish for the openness and joy you share with me to share with Bruce the rest of your lives together. To a long and healthy marriage." Everyone raised their glasses and took sips. Amelia hugged Regina and tried to suppress all the emotions she was feeling, it was quite a day. "Please, enjoy the rest of the wedding."

People lined up for cake, and eventually the music was being queued up for the father -or in this case father figure- of the bride and bride to dance. As _Daughters _by John Mayer started, Alfred led Amelia out onto the dance floor.

"You must forgive me, Amelia my dear, for I'm not as light on my feet as I once was." He smiled, and she laughed as he spun her around. Soon enough, Bruce had led Sophie out and Fathers led their Daughters out to join the couples.

Sooner than Amelia expected, the song was over and Bruce was waiting for Alfred to pass her along to him. As _Dream a Little Dream of Me _by The Mamas and the Papas started, and he spun her, beginning the first danced they'd ever really danced. Amelia had been quite nervous for this moment, considering they'd never danced before, but she let Bruce lead and they turned out pretty well. At the ending note, he did a normal husband thing and dipped her, kissing her sweetly as he brought her back up. She blushed deeply and looked at all the couples watching the bashful pair.

~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~

It was around three in the morning and finally the last guests were leaving the Manor.

"Call me when you get back!" Regina called as David dragged her out the door to let the couple get some rest before they left for their honeymoon tomorrow morning. They were going to fly down to Florida, and board their yacht and sail around the Carribean for about ten days. Then they'd reluctantly make their way back to Florida and back to Gotham. Amelia was very excited, as was Bruce, but Sophie was none too pleased.

"I will, go sleep!" Amelia called out the door. She was ready to get out of her dress and spend her first night with Bruce.

"I love you, Mrs. Wayne." Bruce said, kissing Amelia's temple.

"I love you too, Mr. Wayne."

**A/N: I know, this is super late and I'm super sorry. I've never missed an update but this chapter was really hard. I basically forced myself to sit and write it. lol Weddings are hard, especially trying to make them sweet but not cheesy. I hope I captured this and not butchered it. XD**

**Next chapter will be the last, and I'm trying to keep myself from getting too depressed because once I'm done with this I have Raven, which I'm stuck on, and The Hit Woman which I've completely lost my inspiration for. But, we shall see what else pops up. I was almost thinking maybe a spin off of the movie _Obsessed _featuring Bruce and Amelia, have it a little AU? Let me know.**

**Good? Bad? Lemme know!  
**


	24. Chapter 24

**Chapter 24**

Amelia woke up groggily, a heap of limbs tangled with another, to the incessant sound of her phone ringing. Pulling a sheet up with herself, she went to investigate the annoying beeping; the clock read nine a.m. Flipping the phone open she saw it was Regina and thought it was odd she was calling her now, considering she hadn't called her the whole trip.

"Hello?" She answered sleepily.

"Mommy! You're coming home today and I can't wait!" A small but cheerful voice exclaimed into the phone, Amelia couldn't help but smile.

"Hi, Sophie. Yeah we'll be home soon. In about five hours okay?" Amelia heard Regina's voice in the background saying _'Sophie! I told you not to bother her!' _

"Okay, I love you!"

"I love you too." Looking back at the bed she saw her husband covering his face from the sun before reluctantly getting out of the bed. "We have to be back in Gotham in five hours." Amelia said, somewhat unhappily. The trip had been amazing, they had arrived in Florida, immediately boarding the yacht, sailing all day. They stopped in Turks & Caicos, spent a couple nights, and eventually moved on to the Cayman Islands. They spent a couple nights there and eventually sailed back to Florida where they were now.

"I know, I love it out there but I like our little corrupt Gotham." Bruce said with a smile. There had been no talk of Gotham troubles at all the whole trip, and it was one they definitely needed. They had gotten Sophie a Jamaican Rasta doll plushie in Jamaica and a little backpack that said Grand Cayman on the back for school from the Cayman Islands. They got Regina a little beaded bracelet hand crafted from Jamaica as well.

Around noon, Amelia and Bruce were boarding their plane back to Gotham, and in two hours they would be back in Gotham.

~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~

"Okay Sophie, have your sign ready?" Regina asked the absolutely elated child, who nodded vigorously. Regina, David, and Sophie were waiting at the gate where Amelia and Bruce would come off the private jet any minute now. Regina had a vase full of flowers and Sophie had made a sign that said 'Welcome back Mommy and Daddy' in bright pink letters.

"Sophie!" Amelia called out excitedly opening her arms for the, running, child, ready to be tackled.

"Mommy, Daddy! I missed you so so so much!" Sophie called out excitedly.

"Hi, Sophe." Bruce said, also excitedly to the small child who came bounding over ot him as well.

"So, are you guys excited for the big birthday gala tomorrow?" Regina asked in the car on the way back to Wayne Manor. Bruce and Amelia both groaned simultaneously. "I know, I know, you didn't want to have a big party, but this is what happens when a billionaire marries a billionaire."

"So how's the party planning career going?" Bruce asked, Regina had simply started a blog-like website that Bruce and Amelia both put on the companies websites, to be a party planner.

"I've got six reservations for party for the nest two months since they heard I did your wedding and your birthday." She smiled broadly back at the couple.

"What happened to starting small?" Amelia quirked an eyebrow.

"That would be before I did my rich best friend's wedding to her equally rich fiance that was probably the biggest even this year, and then agreed to plan their birthday party that I may or may not have released press photos to paparazzi to." She smiled back sheepishly. "It kept them busy while I finished decorating."

"Hm, I'm sure we'll be seeing that in the paper tomorrow." Bruce said, Amelia rolled her eyes.

"Ah, the glamorous lifestyles of the rich and the famous."

"So, what's on the agenda for the party?" Amelia asked

"It's a costume party, since it's almost Halloween, I thought we'd do an All Hallow's Eve Ball. You guys are classic twenties Charleston characters and Sophie's a princess, but of course. David and I are going as the bunny and mad hatter from Alice in Wonderland."

"Sounds fun!"

~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~

The party was going swimmingly, everyone seemed to enjoy themselves. Everyone had dressed up, and everyone praised Regina for her party planning abilities.

Everything was moving along great, it was about midnight and Sophie had crashed on one of the couches. When Amelia got back from putting her to bed, the last guests were leaving the house. Regina had checked out about twenty minutes ago, because David had to be up early for work. As Amelia was coming down the grand staircase, something didn't feel right. As she reentered the grand ballroom, she stopped short in the her tracks and screamed. She faintly heard Bruce come into the room, and heard him gasp loudly.

There, on the floor of the dining room, a police officer laid dead in a pool of his own blood and message was written in, what they assumed to be his blood, right there on the marble floor;

_Happy Birthday Lovebirds. Hope to see you soon Don't forget to smile! HA HA HA HA HA HA_

~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~x~

Regina walked into work that morning, tiredly. It had been a couple months since the party, and she had gotten her own office close to home. Amelia had been acting weird around everyone ever since the party, and she hoped that her and Bruce weren't already having problems. She saw that she had a few missed calls, and the first two were from future clients wanting to book parties. The next one, she almost deleted because at first it was just white noise and finally it cleared up, and someone cleared their throat.

_"Hello doll, seems I've missed ya. It seems we have a mutual friend. The baT. So, hopefully we'll see each other soon. Oh, and it seems your friends have neglected to tell you who I am. You can call me Joker."_

And then she heard that laughter that she had heard a couple nights ago on the news. They had replayed a tape of him from his first attack, warning us to watch out for him and that he'd escaped Arkham. _Yeah, a maniac in a purple suit and greasepaint. Hard to miss. _She deleted the voice mail and decided to ignore it for now. It could just be some teenager.

And how some people can be wrong.

**A/N: Dun, dun, duuuuuuuuuuuuun. Here is the last chapter, I'm planning a sequel but, like Not Another Love Story, I'm probably gonna write the first few chapters before I start posting so it may be a while. Also, I may be a little busy this summer so the updates may be erratic. The sequel will be a Regina centered story so it's not really a sequel it will just involve the characters from NALS. Check my page in a few weeks/months for the new story!  
**

**Thank you all for reading and putting up with my nonsense, I appreciate you all!**

**Good? Bad? Lemme know!**


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